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Speaker 1: This Day in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to This Day in History Class, a

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Speaker 1: show that cruises the highways of history every day of

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Speaker 1: the week. I'm Gabe Luesier, and today we're examining the

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Speaker 1: evolution of American license plates from their DIY beginnings to

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Speaker 1: their digital future. The day was April twenty fifth, nineteen

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Speaker 1: oh one. New York became the first state in the

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Speaker 1: US to require license plates on motor vehicles. Prior to that,

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Speaker 1: all the cars in the country had been unregistered and

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Speaker 1: could only be identified by law enforcement through physical traits

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Speaker 1: such as their make, model, and color. The lack of

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Speaker 1: a registration system wasn't a problem in the late eighteen

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Speaker 1: high hundreds, there simply weren't that many cars on the road.

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Speaker 1: But interest in automobiles was steadily rising, and by nineteen

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Speaker 1: oh one, there were enough of them in New York

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Speaker 1: State to warrant legislation signed into law by Governor Benjamin

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Speaker 1: Odell Junior. The Dowdy Bill required owners of motor vehicles

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Speaker 1: to register with the state and to post identifying marks

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Speaker 1: on the back of their vehicle. This led to the

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Speaker 1: development of what we now know as license plates or

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Speaker 1: vehicle registration plates. To be clear. Motor vehicle tags weren't

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Speaker 1: a wholly original idea. They had been in use in

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Speaker 1: France since eighteen ninety three, and other European countries had

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Speaker 1: followed suit shortly after, but New York's take on the

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Speaker 1: concept was a bit different, with the original plates looking

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Speaker 1: nothing like what we're used to today. For starters, the

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Speaker 1: plates weren't a random string of letters and digits. In fact,

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Speaker 1: they didn't have numbers at all, but rather the owner's initials.

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Speaker 1: The plates also weren't issued by the state. Each vehicle

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Speaker 1: owner had to supply their own, either by making it

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Speaker 1: themselves or by purchasing a kit. There weren't any restrictions

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Speaker 1: on materials, style, or color either. Some people mounted house

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Speaker 1: letters onto plates fashioned from metal, leather, or wood, and

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Speaker 1: others painted their initials directly onto their vehicles. The only

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Speaker 1: real requirement was that the letters had to be at

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Speaker 1: least three inches in height for visibility. The new regulation

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Speaker 1: placed some additional burden on car drivers, but it was

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Speaker 1: more than made up for by finally having some acknowledgment

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Speaker 1: from the government. Most existing traffic laws had been written

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Speaker 1: before the advent of the automobile, so in the case

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Speaker 1: of legal disputes with the drivers of horses, car owners

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Speaker 1: had typically found themselves at a disadvantage. Traffic laws also

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Speaker 1: varied from one county to the next, which made it

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Speaker 1: difficult for drivers to know when they were breaking the law.

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Speaker 1: For example, local authorities that preferred people to travel the

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Speaker 1: old fashioned way by horse and buggy would sometimes pass

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Speaker 1: a law banning the use of cars on certain highways

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Speaker 1: or streets, but there was no way for motorists to

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Speaker 1: know that until it was too late. Governor Odell's new

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Speaker 1: act did away with that confusion by making vehicular laws

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Speaker 1: consistent across the state. It also imposed a speed limit

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Speaker 1: of eight miles per hour in cities and fifteen miles

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Speaker 1: per hour in rural areas, placing the owners of motor

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Speaker 1: vehicles under the same rules as the drivers of horses.

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Speaker 1: The law was praised by members of the Automobile Club

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Speaker 1: of America, which had played an instrumental role in the

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Speaker 1: bill's introduction. Within a week of its passage, seventeen people

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Speaker 1: had already applied for motor vehicle licenses, and according to

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Speaker 1: The New York Times, a man named George F. Chamberlain

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Speaker 1: was the first to receive one. By that September, seven

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Speaker 1: hundred and fifteen people had registered their cars in New York,

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Speaker 1: and by April of the following year, the number had

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Speaker 1: more than doubled. As car ownership continued to rise in

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Speaker 1: New York, a major flaw emerged in the state's license

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Speaker 1: plate system. Namely, it was far too easy to cheat

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Speaker 1: the system by using fake initials or by posting your

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Speaker 1: real initials without actually registering with the state. Some people

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Speaker 1: just couldn't bear to part with that one dollar registration fee.

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Speaker 1: In response, the New York state legislature passed a new

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Speaker 1: law in nineteen oh three. It assigned each registered vehicle

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Speaker 1: a number, which then had to be displayed on a

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Speaker 1: license plate following the letters and why. The state also

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Speaker 1: decreed that all plates had to adopt a black and

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Speaker 1: white color scheme, though it would still be up to

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Speaker 1: the owners to supply the plate itself. That same year,

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Speaker 1: the first state issued license plates were distributed in Massachusetts.

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Speaker 1: The very first plate featured just the number one, and

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Speaker 1: it was issued to Frederick Tudor, the son of a

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Speaker 1: wealthy Boston ice merchant known as the Ice King. More

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Speaker 1: than a century later, Tudor's family still holds an active

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Speaker 1: registration on that lucky number one plate. It took a

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Speaker 1: while for other states to start producing their own license plates.

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Speaker 1: New York dragged its feet on the matter until nineteen ten,

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Speaker 1: but as more and more cars began to crowd the roads,

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Speaker 1: the need for stricter regulation became impossible to ignore. By

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Speaker 1: nineteen eighteen, every state in the Union, which was forty

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Speaker 1: eight at the time, had begun issuing its own vehicle

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Speaker 1: license plates, and when Alaska and Hawaii joined in nineteen

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Speaker 1: fifty nine, quickly did the same. By that point, the

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Speaker 1: plates size and materials had been standardized to the twelve

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Speaker 1: by six inch aluminum rectangles that were used to seeing today,

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Speaker 1: although colors, images, and mottos still varied between states. In

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Speaker 1: recent years, some states have begun experimenting with digital license

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Speaker 1: plates that use a small flat panel screen to display

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Speaker 1: a vehicle's info. For now, the technology is mostly suited

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Speaker 1: to businesses with large vehicle fleets to keep track of,

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Speaker 1: but as it becomes cheaper and more accessible, electronic plates

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Speaker 1: may very well become the new standard. It would be

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Speaker 1: a far cry from the homemade leather tags of old

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Speaker 1: New York but I guess when it comes to cars,

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Speaker 1: innovation has always been the name of the game. I'm Gay,

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Speaker 1: Blues Yay, and hopefully you now know a little more

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Speaker 1: about history today than you did yesterday. I like to

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Speaker 1: keep up with the show, You can follow us on Twitter, Facebook,

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Speaker 1: and Instagram at TDI HC Show, and if you have

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Speaker 1: any comments or suggestions, feel free to send them my

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Speaker 1: way by writing to This Day at iHeartMedia dot com.

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Speaker 1: Thanks to kazb Bias for producing the show, and thanks

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Speaker 1: to you for listening. I'll see you back here again

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Speaker 1: tomorrow for another day in History class.