A 1903 Massachusetts license plate
September 1, 1903: Massachusetts becomes the 1st State to require license plates for automobiles. Massachusetts follows in September, and most States follow after that.
France was the 1st country to introduce the registration plate, with the enactment of the Paris Police Ordinance, on August 14, 1893, followed by Germany in 1896. Once those 2 countries did it, the rest of Europe followed. It took Britain until 1904, but, once they did, their entire Empire followed.
Getting an especially low license plate number became a status symbol. Massachusetts had already allowed license plates before New York, through the intervention of Major Henry Lee Higginson, a Civil War hero, prominent banker, philanthropist, and founder of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, who first recommended that the State put a numbered plaque on each motor vehicle.
Henry Lee Higginson
He didn't do it to make a plate a status symbol. Rather, he did it for the same reason the NFL would later demand uniform numbers, and later still a uniform system for uniform numbers, on players: To make it easier to determine the perpetrators of infractions. Higginson hated that the newfangled contraptions were whizzing past his townhouse on Commonwealth Avenue in Boston past the speed limit of 15 miles per hour. He wanted the speeders punished.
And so, and in 1903, the 1st plate actually issued to a car, anywhere in the U.S. was numbered "1," and issued to Frederick Tudor. He was a fabulously wealthy "Boston Brahmin," son of "Ice King" Frederic Tudor, and... a nephew of Henry Lee Higginson. He convinced Governor John L. Bates to intervene and let him have "1." As of 2022, the plate is still held by the Tudor family, on a Mercedes-Benz station wagon.
Frederick Tudor, 1929
When he was Governor in 1935 and '36, James Michael Curley had a car with license plate "S-1," "S" for "State." Tales of "S-1" being recklessly driven by Curley's chauffeur didn't help his career, and instead of running for re-election as Governor, he ran for the U.S. Senate, and lost. His next private car, a Lincoln limousine, had Massachusetts plate "5," which he had picked up after it was forfeited by a prominent Massachusetts Republican who had been convicted of drunk driving. Having previously served 3 very successful terms as Mayor of Boston, he ran for a 4th, and won. But he pushed his luck, ran for a 5th, and posed for a picture with his car, which still had the "5" plate. It didn't work: He lost. As of 2022, his family still has plate "5.".
At least 2 of Franklin D. Roosevelt's cars are preserved and on display as museum pieces. At his Presidential Library at Hyde Park, his car has New York license plate "3." He had previously had plate "1," because that belonged to the Governor, and the Lieutenant Governor had plate "2." At his "Little White House" in Warm Springs, where he died in 1945, a car is preserved with Georgia plate "FDR-1."
In 1928, Idaho became the 1st State to put a motto or a slogan on their plates. Even then, they were famous for one particular crop.
In 1931, Pennsylvania formally issued the 1st American personalized plates, or "vanity plates," allowing drivers to request their initials. In the 1960s, California popularized modern vanity plates by giving drivers the opportunity to spell out words and phrases using a mix of letters and numbers.
These became especially popular among athletes. In California, Willie Mays of the San Francisco Giants got "SAY HEY." While with the Oakland Athletics, Reggie Jackson put his uniform number on, and got "REG-9." When Hank Aaron of the Atlanta Braves, broke the career home run record on April 8, 1974, the Governor, Jimmy Carter, gave him Georgia plate "HLA 715," for "Henry Louis Aaron" and the 715 home runs.
Personalized plates do not allow for profanities, but some people have gotten around this. I once heard of a California urologist who got "PP MD." On the TV show Seinfeld, Cosmo Kramer (played by Michael Richards) mistakenly got the plates of a proctologist, reading, "ASSMAN." Such a plate would not be allowed in real life.
Other notable personalized plates on TV have included California "KNIGHT" for KITT on Knight Rider, and the plates for the Ewing family on Dallas: Jock (Jim Davis) had Texas plate "EWING 1," Miss Ellie (Barbara Bel Geddes) had "EWING 2," J.R. (Larry Hagman) had "EWING 3," Bobby (Patrick Duffy) had "EWING 4," J.R.'s wife Sue Ellen (Linda Gray) had "EWING 5," Bobby's wife Pam (Victoria Principal) had "EWING 6," and niece Lucy (Charlene Tilton) had "EWING 7."
On the TV show Batman, 3 different plates were used: "2F-3567" and "TP-6597" appeared in the 1st season, 1966, with "GOTHAM 1966" where the State's name would go; and in the 2nd and 3rd season, with "GOTHAM CITY" where the State's name would go, it was "BAT-1."
In the Rocky films, Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) has a car with Pennsylvania plate "SOTHPAW," because he's lefthanded, a "southpaw"; and a motorcycle with "STALION," short for his nickname, "the Italian Stallion." The 1959 Cadillac ambulance that served as the title characters' ride in Ghostbusters had New York plate "ECTO 1." The DeLorean time machine in Back to the Future had California plate "OUTATIME." John Hughes' films tended to have vanity plates for Illinois, including the Ferris Bueller's Day Off 1961 Ferrari reading "NRVOUS," for its owner, the never-seen Morris Frye, who was "nervous."
The opening sequence to L.A. Law showed a California plate "LA LAW," based on the Porsche driven by Arnie Becker (Corbin Bernsen): The 1st scene of the series showed the Porsche stuck in typically bad Los Angeles traffic, with the plate "LITIG8R" for "Litigator." On Home Improvement, Tim Taylor (Tim Allen), host of the show-within-a-show Tool Time, put Michigan plate "2L TIME" on his 1933 Ford hot rod.
By a weird coincidence, my grandparents were named George and Grace -- not to be confused with the husband & wife comedy team of George Burns and Gracie Allen -- and the 1st cars that I can remember them having were Grandpa's Ford Galaxie, whose plate began with the letters "GEO"; and Grandma's Pontiac Catalina, whose plate began with "GRA." They didn't ask for those, that's just what they got.
My mother, who has a bad sense of direction, once saw a bumper sticker saying, "Don't follow me: I'm lost, too!" Ever since, she has said that if she ever got vanity plates, they would read "IMLOST2."
*
September 1, 1903 was a Tuesday. These baseball games were played:
* A doubleheader was played at Columbia Park in Philadelphia. The New York Highlanders won the opener over the Philadelphia Athletics, 5-1. Willie Keeler went 4-for-5. Clark Griffith outpitched Eddie Plank. The nightcap was tied at 1-1 after 9 innings, when the umpires called the game due to darkness. This time, Keeler went 0-for-3. Harry Howell and Charles "Chief" Bender each went the whole way. The Highlanders officially became the New York Yankees in 1913.
* The New York Giants beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 7-3 at the 1890-1911 version of the Polo Grounds. Dan McGann hit a home run, and Sam Mertes went 4-for-4 with an RBI.
* The Brooklyn Superbas swept a doubleheader from the Boston Beaneaters, 8-3 and 5-0 at the 1894-1914 version of the South End Grounds in Boston. Henry Schmidt pitched a 2-hit shutout in the 2nd game. The Superbas became the Dodgers in 1911. The Beaneaters went through some name changes until 1912, when they became the Boston Braves.
* The Boston Americans beat the Washington Senators, 2-1 at National Park in Washington. The Americans became the Red Sox in 1908.
* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Chicago Cubs, 3-0 at the West Side Grounds in Chicago. Bill Phillips pitched a 4-hit shutout.
* The Cleveland Naps beat the St. Louis Browns, 4-0 at the 1898-1908 version of Sportsman's Park in St. Louis. Ed Killian pitched a 7-hit shutout. The Cleveland team was named for its manager and 2nd baseman, Napoleon "Nap" Lajoie, who did not play on this day. They became the Cleveland Indians in 1915, and the Cleveland Guardians in 2022.
* The Detroit Tigers and the Chicago White Sox were rained out at South Side Park in Chicago. Due to the lateness of the season, and both teams being out of the race, the game was never made up.
* And the Pittsburgh Pirates and the St. Louis Cardinals were rained out at Robison Field in St. Louis. (Not "Robinson.") This game was also never made up.
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