VioletPixel

đźš“ Speed-Minder

Marcin Wichary shared a fascinating bit of history:

A black and white photo of the rear of an old (1950s–1960s) state police car driving on a road. A large round analog spedometer is mounted on the roof, facing backwards, with the words 'speed check' written below the dial. On the back of the car it says 'state police' in large letters with 'check your speed' written below in smaller letters.

This was a “Speed-Minder” deployed by Illinois State Police in the late 1950s or early 1960s. The car didn’t have a radar, it just reported its own speed, which I thought was clever. I am not even sure if it was as much to prevent drivers going too fast – I guess that’s what the name suggests – or just to help you calibrate your car’s own speedometer.

Fascinating! There are a couple more pictures in Marcin's post, but I wanted a few more. Unfortunately, these things don't seem to be well-documented online, so I didn't find much.

What I did find was a toy version of the same type of car from New York. This version is a little more forceful; it includes prominent "SPEED KILLS" wording on both the speedometer and the rear of the car. Not sure if this version actually existed as a real car or not, but it seems like an oddly specific thing to make into a toy of if it didn't exist.