I was looking over some 1950s Hot Rod magazines last night and almost every lead sled custom had spotlights on the cowl. I got to thinking, why after chopping, nosing, decking, removing the door handles, frenching the headlights and doing everything to make their cars lines clean as possible did they add spotlights? In fact some cars had dummy spots, any ideas where this trend came from?
Way back before the post-war economic boom, many small towns and/or rural areas had no street lights or very few of them. In the '30's, police and fire vehicles, plus some motorists started adding on the spotlights. They were helpful for spotting street signs, house address numbers, etc. What started as a practical item became sort of a fashion add-on by the late '40's.
As a kid growing up in the late 40s and 50s every car we had had spotlights as did all of our pickups on the ranch. They were used extensively for checking water, checking livestock and shooting varmints as well. All the cars we had then had spotlights-1st I recall was our 41 Ford convert after the war, then my mom's 49 Buick roadmaster convert.
For the guys with hot rods and fast customs it may have originally so they had more light to drive with when driving fast at night. Out on the long roads where you were driving well above the speed limit you need more light than the old six volt headlights gave so you stuck a spot light on the car to shine down the road. It didn't look balanced so you put one on the passenger side and then other guys started doing it because they thought yours looked cool and the fad had begun.
This has been the subject of at least one previous thread and I believe the best answer then was: "If the factories had issued two spotlights on every car, that would have been the first thing removed by the customizers".
I think there is at least one other thread here on them. As already stated, very practical on dark roads, to find places, etc. But I always thought spot light pong on the drive-in movie screen was the coolest use! But only before the show or at intermission. After the movie started, you could be asking for trouble! Gary
Spotlights were just the finishing touch back in the 40's, if you wern't running twin "Appeltons" you were not "Cool". Same with fender skirts, & knitted baby"Booties"hanging from the rear view mirror. My girlfriend (now my wife of 62 yrs.), made some for me in 1949, to hang on the old '41 Chev.club coupe, all the "Dice" fad came years later.----Don
According to guys like George Barris who were into hot rods in the forties, spotlights were very useful at impromptu drag races out among the bean fields. They were used for signaling and for spotting oncoming cars, by spectators parked beside the road.That is why so many hot rods and customs had spot lights. For this and other reasons they were made illegal in 1951. After that "dummy" spots were left on the cars,They took out the bulbs and wiring but left the spotlight on the car. If they took them off they would have left some ugly holes. Von Dutch said he added the first "dummy" spots to a car that never had them, to cover up some grinder marks or flaws on a bad chop job. This was a common problem with lacquer primer and spot putty. If you did not let it dry long enough you could do a beautiful paint job, then a few weeks later the primer would sink and you would see all kinds of grinder marks, low spots and flaws that were not there when you painted it. He invented decorative pinstriping to cover up these "chicken scratches" as he called them. Other than hiding flaws and holes, I guess the dummy spots were an homage to the early days of customs and street racing.
I'm curious as to what your source is/was on this. Or are you simply speaking of Canadian laws? My 1953 Jet has a pair of working, factory-equipped Appletons, and it was built in Illinois in late 1953.
I was talking about California but other jurisdictions have similar laws. I believe it is now illegal to have a spotlight except on an official vehicle, all across the country. My source was mainly old car magazines that I read over the last 50 years.
V C Section 24404 Spotlamps Spotlamps 24404. (a) A motor vehicle may be equipped with not to exceed two white spotlamps, which shall not be used in substitution of headlamps. (b) No spotlamp shall be equipped with any lamp source exceeding 32 standard candlepower or 30 watts nor project any glaring light into the eyes of an approaching driver. (c) Every spotlamp shall be so directed when in use: That no portion of the main substantially parallel beam of light will strike the roadway to the left of the prolongation of the left side line of the vehicle. That the top of the beam will not strike the roadway at a distance in excess of 300 feet from the vehicle. (d) This section does not apply to spotlamps on authorized emergency vehicles. (e) No spotlamp when in use shall be directed so as to illuminate any other moving vehicle. Amended Ch. 544, Stats. 1967. Effective November 8, 1967. http://www.dmv.ca.gov/pubs/vctop/d12/vc24404.htm
My understanding of the use of spotlights is they came about from the use of them on the more expensive cars in the mid to late 20's to early 30's....then they were mounted on the tops of the sidemounted spare tyres and /or beside the front windscreen to allow them to be moved to look for street numbers etc, and I suppose as the more streamlined styling and designs came into being they were mounted on the cowl either side of the windscreen.......these were proper internally adjustable spotlights which were I suppose relatively expensive and required a bit more finesse to mount .......but with "dummy" spotlights the mounting was pretty straightforward.......2 holes for the screws and they would have been much cheaper............voila!!.......your car has the "look" of an expensive, upmarket car without the expensive price........I am not old enough to verify these thoughts but from what I've read in various articles etc over the past 40yrs or so this seems like as good a reason as any...........lol...................andyd
Received this today from Deuce Daddy Don and thought it was too good not to share. "I can atest to the spotlights for night drag racing! Lincoln blvd. that runs diagonal from LAX to Manchester Ave., was a perfect 1/4 mile stretch with low bluffs on each side containing bean fields back in the late '40s. Guys cruising the driveins with hot cars would choose off each other, & head for the "Strip" on Lincoln, with all the "onlookers" folowing. We would line up next to the "Strip" up on the bean field bluffs to watch the hot dogs race, they always run with lights off, flashing by at high speeds (rumor had it that with lights off the spark would be hotter!). One guy at each end of Lincoln blvd. would have spotlights, if the cops came around, they would flash the spots to let everyone know to scatter. I almost got stuck in the soft soil getting away one late night. That was many years ago!----Don"