For example: the past year or so.
That photo reminds me of my brothers and me riding seated on the tailgate of the station wagon with our legs hanging off the back, in southern California, 1965.
I have a 4 runner. that supposedly sees seven ; except for I have all my tools and crap in the back
and so when I go to take five or six kids to the YMCA
I just throw seats on top of all my tools and crap
and even the wife accepts that
it’s good aplerently because the seatbelts still work
Now look all last 1970s tapes - we do have to agree with seatbelts don’t we?
Lol. X. 3000. X. Lol. Lo double L. !!
I still laugh at a stand up comic once saying when he grew up there were metal dashboards and no seatbelts. If there was a car accident they just hosed off the dashboard.
My father had an old sixties car he was very proud of and a small metal statue of St. Anthony, patron Saint of Travelers, on the dashboard. It was held there with a magnet (metal dash). He was telling my brother how that little statue would protect him on the road.
My brother piped up and said, ‘are you kidding? If we’re in an accident that thing will rocket to the back like a missile and if it hits either one of us were dead!’
I thought it was pretty funny.
My dad was a master at using rope. He used to stack grass hay bales so high on his 3/4 ton Dodge Powerwagon flatbed so high that it barely made it under traffic lights. When we were kids he let my brother, sisters and I ride on the top of the load on the way home. My little brother was about 5. We all loved it! It felt like we were flying.
One time the load felt a little unstable and we were very disappointed that he would not let us ride the 20 miles home on top of the load. We all had to squeeze into the unseatbelted cab. But we hit a dip in the road on the way home and the truck started swaying back and forth and almost all the bales of grass hay ended up in the middle of a busy 4 lane road. We started throwing the bales back on the truck as fast as we could. A few of them broke open. We heard sirens coming our way. Dad through some rope over the mess and we got out of there as fast as we could and onto some side roads. An expensive ticket was narrowly avoided.
Great picture. My friend’s parents had a wagon and the seats were rear facing. What a great car - a 1970 Mercury Colony Park. Another had a Country Squire with a table and side seats.
Insurance companies pressure is why we have this.
Why don’t school buses have seat belts? Only driver has 1.
The ONLY friends I lost growing up were two that on prom night tried to pass another car on a blind curve.
Thousands of school chums from K to 12, none died from the things the busybodies claimed they would.
It would be instructive to examine the relationship between the child safety seat manufacturer(s) of the time and the political sponsors of the bill mandating their use.
flr
That’s easy. Because before seat belts were made mandatory, there were very few superhighways in the U.S. The superhighway system began under Eisenhower. Before that, speed limits were lower everywhere, and Americans were more polite and law-abiding.
However, deadly accidents were caused either by reckless teenagers, sleepy drivers or alcohol, either to themselves or to innocent safe drivers they would run into. When there were either hard brakings or collisions, unrestrained children’s large heads in relation to body would propel them out through the windows of the car or smash fhem against the dashboard or windshield. If they were held on a passenger’s lap, the full weight of the adult would be thrown forward, crushing the child.
Seat belts and child restraints do save lives. Except for stupid or wicked parents who leave their kids in a hot car. But the numbers of those don’t even compare.
Growing up, my father would cut the seat belts out of the cars he bought. Said it made it easier to vacuum the seats at the car wash.