The Rise and Fall of Hitchhiking in the US

History ^ | July 17, 2025 | John Friedman

[DoodleBob]

It was once all too common to drive down a two-lane highway and spot a stranger on the side of the road, thumb out, a bag slung over their shoulder or resting by their side.

During the Great Depression, jobless Americans thumbed rides from strangers as they traveled far and wide in search of opportunity. Amid World War II, picking up a hitchhiking soldier became a patriotic duty. The practice later became associated with the hippie lifestyle of the counterculture movement—a chance to break free from the status quo.

“For quite a number of decades, it was not considered a particularly dangerous thing to do,” says Ginger Strand, author of Killer on the Road: Violence and the American Interstate. “It was simply a way of sharing resources.”

….

In the 1960s and '70s, enforcement of stricter state laws and local ordinances sought to regulate or limit hitchhiking, and federal law enforcement agencies began actively warning about its dangers. One FBI poster depicted a well-dressed hitchhiker and informed motorists that a stranger could be a “friendly traveler or a vicious murderer.” In reality, Reid says, “It was less about hitchhiking and more about, how do we get rid of this countercultural presence?”

By the mid-1970s, hitchhiking began to decline in the United States, …Stopping and pulling over was suddenly more dangerous. All the while, the counterculture movement was dying down.

…

It didn’t help hitchhiking’s cause that a few high-profile murder cases involving hitchhikers became media sensations, and the warnings proliferated. At the same time, the high way killer quickly became a common trope in American culture, Strand says.

“It becomes a theme in movies,” Strand says. “Before that, hitchhiking was typically only used in Hollywood movies as a meet-cute. Then it becomes a way of introducing mayhem.”

---

TOPICS: History; Society
KEYWORDS: 2laneblacktop; hitchhiking; interstate; restareas; ridersonthestorm

[DoodleBob]

You have to be nuts to hitchhike or pick up a hitchhiker.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

I hitchiked the 17 miles from my Jesuit high school to my house all the time in the late ‘60s.

[PeterPrinciple]

As of June 2025, hitchhiking is fully illegal in six U.S. states. While most states permit it, a vast majority have laws against standing directly in the road or obstructing the flow of traffic.

[ansel12]

I’m probably the ultimate hitchhiker here since I did it for years and not from a point A to a point B method of getting someplace (although I did do that sometimes cross country), but as a lifestyle, just randomly drifting around the nation.

[dfwgator]

Can’t stand Roger Waters, but this has some nice playing by Eric Clapton.

Roger Waters - 5:01AM (The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking, Pt. 10)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWwJzpHdX1M

[T.B. Yoits]

[DoodleBob]

I can’t remember the last time I saw a hitchhiker.

[Dilbert San Diego]

Yep, it’s way too dangerous to think about doing this or picking up hitchhikers

[oldplayer]

I wasn’t a casual or regular hitchhiker back in the late 60’s or early 70’s. I had hippie-like friends who did it all the time.

My hitchhiking was done pursuant to unreliable motorcycles.

But, I still pick up folks time to time. You sometimes get some interesting tales.

[ansel12]

They are pretty rare nowadays but still out there, I keep an old jacket and have stuff in the vehicle in case I see one on the highway or interstate who is unprepared, or looks like they have been out in the sun too long.

[frank ballenger]

Classic hitchhiker Jack Kerouac:

“ ...one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn’t make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you are going all the way and don’t plan to stay in hotels.”
― Jack Kerouac, On the Road

[Bonemaker]

Long story short.
1. AIR Force related
2.Me and buddy drunk.
3. Out god knows where in remote vicinity of.Kirtland AFB, Albuquerque, NM 3 am in morning.

4. Needed to get back to base.
5. Hitchiked.
6. Picked up by Mexican guy in cool convertible.
7. Very nice guy lectured us on dangers of gringos hitchiking in New Mexico at night.

8, Showed us his pachuco tatoo.

9. Dropped us at base and said adios.
10. True story.

[frank ballenger]

Soundtrack for this thread. The Marvin Gaye version was the one the Rolling Stones heard before working on theirs.

Hitchhike.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmClweWITZQ

[PGR88]

As a teen, my oldest brother and two friends used to jump trains and ride box cars to see where the trains would go.

they once rode from suburban NY City to Cincinnati, where they were spotted by some rail police, and escaped into nearby woods.

They then hitchhiked back home

mom and dad were furious

[ansel12]

Why did he hitchhike if he didn’t like learning about people and listening to them and knowing that many of them were picking you up to tell you about their private thoughts that they can’t share with others?

That is a lousy sentiment for a hitcher and a strange attitude for a writer.

[frank ballenger]

Advice——Rework that a little and submit it as a poem to American Poetry Review or Poetry. Sparse. Evocative.

Remember, this is considered a famous classic by William Carlos Williams:

The Red Wheelbarrow
By William Carlos Williams (1938 from Collected Poems...)

so much depends
upon

a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens

[Sam Clements]

I started hitch hiking while in junior high in the mid sixties. This was in my small New England town and it was strictly just to get around. My brother and I did this and we rarely waited more than 5 minutes for a ride. Upon graduating from high school in 1969 I started attending UMass in Amherst, a distance of 60 miles. For 4 years I used this method frequently to go home for weekends and then back to school on Sunday nights. Again, not much of a problem. My parents never once questioned it. We used to call it “thumbing a ride.” I wasn’t a hippy or anything like that, just a regular, resourceful kid. I admit that it is not a good idea today.

[Salman]

You have to be nuts to hitchhike or pick up a hitchhiker.

I have done both, but not in this century. Nor would I now even if I were young.

[frank ballenger]

Sad that he was broke when he died, lamenting in his posthumous collected letters that he could only publish short pieces that magazine publishers expected for free or for an honorarium. Had been writing sports articles for newspapers and had only small amounts of book money despite being on Steve Allen and William F. Buckley TV shows.

His On the Road was later selected as one of the 100 most important novels of the 20th Century.

[John Milner]

I have never done it. Nor have I picked one up. I did get picked up by neighbors one time when our truck broke down on the way to church. About 1970. I was always too chicken.

Our neighbor girl, who I sometimes rode to school with when I was still in Jr High, picked up a hitchhiker one morning on the way to school. I was a bit scared but it was harmless. This was approximately 1970.

I do see one once in a while at the very busy interstate entrance ramp nearby - with the destination cardboard sign. But not often.