I've had our Connecticut version of vintage plates, called "Early American"
plates for a few years. They are black on white versus the old white on
blue standard plates. They also showed a circa 1910 vehicle on the left of
the plate & the letters "E A" vertically on the right. No big deal that the
E A stood for Early AMERICAN on a British car. Not many people knew what
the letters meant.
I recently received my "new reflective" plates for my '66 B. These plates
are being issued as replacements for ALL existing non-reflective plates over
the next year or so. The alleged reason is for visibility at night. Why do
I suspect that the real reason is so the CT cops can get better readings
with their laser guns? Hmmm.
However, in the process, the design has been changed so that the right-side
"E A" has been replaced by the words "Early American" emblazoned across the
bottom of the plate. Now, that is a real insult to all owners of
non-American old cars with these plates. I hope the 4-C's (I believe that
stands for Connecticut Council of Car Clubs) will lobby to correct this
miscarriage. Meanwhile, I have used a magic marker to write "Non-" in the
space between the two words. And, as much as I dislike the dealer-supplied
license plate frames advertising their dealerships, I will install one with
a lower section large enough to obscure those words as soon as I find one
with an appropriate message.
BTW, as someone in the advertising business, I have always insisted that any
dealer selling me a car treat those frames and their decals/logos as
advertising and pay me a monthly fee for that advertising space. Like
roadside billboards, they have a dollar value based on the areas in which I
drive. All dealers have been very quick to carefully remove those
advertising signs in order to avoid paying me to do their advertising. How
many of you are being paid to advertise your car dealers?
I digress. Back to "vintage plates." Despite my displeasure with this new
design, I will continue to use them since they allow unlimited use for any
purpose, and the cars so registered can only be assessed for personal
property taxes at a maximum of $500. While it only saves me about a hundred
dollars a year on my MGB, imagine how much it saves someone with a Ferrari
GTO.
Norm Sippel
'66 MGB
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