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Live free or die is also the motto of the U.S. state of New Hampshire, who ironically mandated that it be placed on all licence plates and attempted to sue people who refused.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_Free_or_Die

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Although it's not clear from the title, the article is about the origins of fake license plates that were a copy of a NH license plate from the 1980's with the number "UNIX".

The article is about both real vanity plates and fake promotional ones.

Compaq later created similar promotional license plates with the number "LINUX," and yes, they still said "Live Free or Die" on them. I managed to wheedle one out of a trade show representative, knowing the history of the original "UNIX" promotional plates.

Besides the motto and the big number, the plates carry the Compaq logo, "1999" (the year they were made), and the statement "LINUX is a Registered Trademark of Linus Torvalds."

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