THE BAD OL' DAYS: Automotive Edition. Just received, in today's mail, the bestseller which prefigured Unsafe At Any Speed by 30 years:
SUDDEN DEATH AND HOW TO AVOID IT
In 1934, the second worst year of the depression, when fewer people were driving, over a million Americans were injured in car accidents, and 36,000 died. One wonders what the toll was for 1928 and 1929, with far more drivers on the road. Readers Digest commissioned J.C. Furnas to investigate this appalling number, and his expose "...And Sudden Death," which appeared in the August 1935 issue, became a hot topic and, eventually, the most reprinted article in Readers' Digest history.
The book, which followed, contained the initial VERY gory article, plus a second essay (Better Off Dead) about the afterlife of being maimed in a car wreck, and a third, long, drivers' safety piece. It sold about as well as the article did, but was issued in cheap paperback form and has a survival rate approaching zero.
In it, we learn that:
A) Our cars are more dangerous than they should be, especially the used ones, and...
B) We are a nation of horrible drivers. We speed. We drive drunk. We take stupid risks. 27 fatal accidents along the Astor Flats section of the Albany Post Road in one summer (presumably 1933 or '34) caused by incautious passing at high speed with ensuing head on collision, being a prime example. And..
C) Quite interesting is the section on post-traumatic stress. They dont refer to it by that name but, nevertheless, they discuss the phenomenon of people who physically survive but who cannot mentally cope with what happened. Depression; fatigue; loss of memory; impared coordination; rage; alcoholism...
Following the article/bestseller, America got into a progressive WE'VE GOT TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS mood. By 1939, automatic turn signals were appearing on cars, there was a-perhaps grudging- effort to make cars more survivable in the case of accidents, and a VERY big emphasis on driver safety.
The effort, evidently, paid off. But as the 1950s progressed and cars got bigger, faster, and more cheaply constructed, the toll began to rise again. In 1959, the Department of Commerce reported the dismaying fact that, by their calculations, 51,000 people a year would die in car accidents by 1975. The following year saw 1934's grim statistic equalled, and then things really skyrocketed:
1960: 36,399
1965: 47,089
1970: 52,627
1975: 44,525
1980: 51,091
1985: 43,825
1990: 44,599
1991: 41,508
1992: 39,250
1993: 40,150
1994: 40,716
1995: 41,817
1996: 42,065
1997: 42,013
1998: 41,501
1999: 41,717
2000: 41,945
2001: 42,116
In 1960: 89,000,000 US drivers and 36,000+ fatalities.
2003: 196,000,00 US drivers and 42,000+ fatalities.
So, as much as people like to whine about today's cheaply built, "unsafe," cars and like to wax nostalgic about the Ole Days When Cars Were Built Like Tanks, we are almost infinitely safer behind the wheel now than we were in 1934, and appreciably safer than in 1960 or even 1975.
".. make sure that every member of the party carries identification papers. It is difficult to identify a body with its whole face bashed in or torn off."
"... a nine months old baby, surrounded by broken glass and yet absolutely unhurt. A fine practical joke on death--but spoiled by the baby's parents,still sitting on either side of him, instantly killed by shattering their skulls on the dashboard..."
"Once a pretty girl has her face scraped off against frozen gravel, her chances of getting it back are uncomfortably slim."
The book, if you can find it (it took me thirty years of searching!) gives fascinating insight into The Bad Old Days.
