Photo by Clayton Cardinalli on Unsplash
Earlier this month, Ohio released a list of the personalized license plate applications the state rejected in 2024. Ohio denied these requested plates because they were too crude, explicit, racist, sexist, homophobic, or otherwise offensive.
The length and breadth of the list—more than 900 in all—is staggering. Take a look.
It makes me wonder if the (mostly) good people of Ohio did much else in 2024 except sit around and channel their inner Butthead to come up with ideas for personalized license plates.
Of course, I know this isn’t entirely true. Take the Cleveland Browns (or, as they say these days in Northeast Ohio, “Take the Browns … please.”). They spent 2024 losing 14 of 17 football games. Then there’s Elly De La Cruz of the Cincinnati Reds who found time in 2024 to steal 67 bases.
Close friends in Columbus collectively polished a debut novel, tended beehives, and tackled ambitious and amazing backyard landscaping projects—all while taking up pickleball.
But for nearly 1,000 Ohioans, their 2024 goal appears to have been to pull a fast one on the state so they could drive around with a personalized license plate that would make Bart Simpson proud.
The legend of the green Firebird
The history of license plates in the U.S. dates back to 1901, when New York first required them. The first plates were homemade and displayed only the owner’s initials. Massachusetts became the first state to issue plates to vehicle owners in 1903, and by the end of World War I, the other 47 states had followed suit.
Personalized license plates became an option in the early 1930s. Nearly a century later, however, they still only account for a small percentage of state-issued plates.
Growing up in West Virginia in the 1970s and 1980s, I hardly ever saw them. The rare exceptions were license plates on vehicles driven by state officials who wanted everyone to know they were state officials. As I recall, they had abbreviated plate numbers that often featured either just a number or the official’s initials and a graphic of the state seal. A big reason there were few personalized plates in my home state was their cost, which exceeded most motorists’ budgets.
When I went to Virginia to attend college in the mid-1980s, I saw personalized license plates everywhere. They were much cheaper there. Plus, Virginia also required front and back plates. This offered an additional canvas for expressing one’s creativity, if not always one’s good taste.
My favorite was on a vintage green Pontiac Firebird I regularly saw on campus. It read 3M TA3. Spotted from behind, this appeared to be just another traditional alphanumeric license plate. But when you were driving directly ahead of the Firebird and viewed the front license plate in your rearview mirror, you got the joke.
A way to stand out
When it gets down to it, personalized license plates are another form of self-expression, a way to stand out in an age when vehicles have become largely homogenized.
I always thought I would get one someday. That changed after a friend told me about driving his wife’s car, which had a TEACHER plate. (Care to guess what she did for a living?)
He cut somebody off in traffic and exchanged shouts and middle fingers with the other driver. Later, it occurred to him that having a memorable license plate, one that could easily be recounted to a police officer—or recognized by a colleague who otherwise might not have known who was tailgating them on the freeway—wasn’t necessarily such a great idea.
Sometimes it’s best just to blend in.
No PNA CUP for you!
What’s your dream job? I can’t think of a profession I would enjoy more than evaluating personalized license plate applications. What’s more, I’d be great at it!
Think you’ll get 60NINE, LONG1, or BUB LVR by me? Think again.
NCE AZZ, HRT 2 FRT, or PNA CUP? You’d have no chance.
On the other hand, I might not be the best person for this role. I’d have a hard time (huh huh, I said “hard”), given the somewhat stunted maturation of my sense of humor, rejecting the most creative requests.
For example, even if I’d never watched The Office, I would’ve readily rubberstamped Todd Packer’s application for his infamous license plate expressing admiration for the great William Hung.
Whether I’d be an effective license plate gatekeeper or not, I can save you a lot of time and worry about your plate application getting rejected by your state.
My advice: apply for a plate that reads LOOK AT ME.
That pretty much sums up what all personalized license plates say, anyway.
