Baby bike seat?

[XCashier]

Oh yeah, and whatever way you go, invest in a rear view mirror.

Reflectors and lights would be good, too.

Some time around 1973, we were driving around in suburban Illinois, where we lived at the time, and 3 year old Jester, sitting in the right side back seat decided it would be a brilliant idea to open my car door.

And that is precisely why when my kid was little, we used that switch that prevented the back doors from being opened from the inside. (I know that wasn't an option for your mom, those weren't invented until much later [my kid was born in 2001].)

We've made some very good strides forward in child safety. Heck, I remember my car seat: black vinyl and bare metal. Imagine riding in that in a car with iffy air conditioning...in July...in Phoenix!!!

[Kheldarson]

Reflectors and lights would be good, too.

Have reflectors, but no lights. I really don't do night rides.


But a couple of pics:

[purple]

look like he loves it

[Jester]

And that is precisely why when my kid was little, we used that switch that prevented the back doors from being opened from the inside. (I know that wasn't an option for your mom, those weren't invented until much later [my kid was born in 2001].)

Yeah, such features weren't available in 1973. Hell, we had rear seat seat belts, but I don't think we always wore them, and I don't think the law required us to at the time.

Hell, this was a 1970 pea green Plymouth Fury Suburban station wagon, which we called The Jolly Green Giant. As a car, its most distinguishing feature was that it sucked in just about every way.

[Jester]

This is a relatively representative picture of the horror that was the aforementioned green atrocity my mother drove and in which I (and my sisters) gave her more than a few heart attacks.

[BearLeeBadenaugh]

Jester, that reminds me of the wagon we road tripped to a pink floyd concert in. Our driver fell asleep on the way home and drove us through a billboard. 8 of the 9 people in the car piled out and pushed the beast back onto the highway. Small dent in the bumper and some scratches on the hood. And we had driven through the post holding the sign up. They don't make em like they used to.

[Jester]

Bear, your vehicle may have been indestructible, or bordering on it. My mom's wagon was anything but. I dare say they coined the term "lemon" in reference to cars directly because of that car. Size of a rhino, engine power of a hamster, with the reliability of Eastern Bloc cars, despite it being manufactured by one of the Big Three U.S. automakers. Handled like a bloated corpse in a pool of molasses, with the added bonus of the turn indicators being mounted on the far ends of the front fenders, rather than in the instrument cluster like a normal car. And all this was made clear to me as a child who never had the displeasure of driving the damn thing. All that, and to top it off, the ugliest pea green color you've even seen on a car this side of bachelor party puke. I still can't quite figure what my parents were thinking when they bought it, especially considering all the other wonderful and/or practical cars they purchased over the years. Yes, they had three kids and needed a vehicle with space, but I refuse to believe this was the best option, or even in the top 30, on the market at the time. (And that's with the knowledge that there probably weren't even twenty options on the market at the time.)

I'm glad it didn't survive long enough for me to learn how to drive in it, though admittedly, that would have prepared me for a career in the military operating large unwieldy vehicles.

I'm fully convinced that, had it been our wagon that hit that sign post, it would have been the post that came away without a scratch.

(Was it really that bad, you may ask? No. It was far, far worse.)

[Jester]

By contrast, my father's car was a thing of great beauty. A cherry red convertible 1970 Volkswagen Karmann Ghia. A working man's sports car for the time, and a worthy successor to the many Triumphs my parents owned before my time. Was it the greatest car for its time? No. But it was unquestionably sweet, and all three of us kids loved it. And all three of us, without ever having met her, hated the woman who rear-ended it and totaled it.

Today, that car, in good shape, commands about a $10,000 price tag. I know, as I've looked. Many, many times. If I ever win the lottery, that won't be the only car I'd buy, it it would definitely be one of them.