DRIVER'S SIDE DIATRIBE
By Al Vinikour    

I spend a lot of time in traffic and being an auto writer the voices in my head tell me I am to notice those cars around me. I was sitting at a stoplight the other day and was looking at what can only have been a one-time police car. It was a ‘70s Dodge Diplomat with the tell-tale wide tires and small hub caps.

As I stared at the vehicle and wondered how many miscreants of justice sat in that back seat either considering their fate and/or double-checking what they ate for lunch I noticed the vehicle had two — count them — two spotlights. It got me to thinking how few of those items are on the road  today – even on police cars.

When I was growing up in the coveted state of Indiana — where dinosaurs roamed the earth and it was still possible to get a mug of root beer and a decent hot dog at Dog ‘N Suds, cars with spotlights were rather common. Few things were cooler than a tricked out 1958 Ford with baby spots on the fender. (Stop laughing, all you young piss-ants this was another era.) Yes, there were dual spotlights on police and civilian cars alike.

My Dad was even a member of the Sheriff’s Auxiliary and as such was authorized to install a siren on his vehicle. Consequently, he felt it obligatory to have spotlights as well because a lot of times he would be driving late at night and if he happened to see someone violating the law — like driving 50 miles over the speed limit — he would give chase and a blinding spotlight shining into the rear window of a speeding vehicle on a pitch-black Hoosier night garnered a lot of attention.

So many people had functional spotlights installed on their vehicles that there were even laws about when and how they could be used. For instance, let’s say you were speeding down Route 30 (I could get away with this because my next-door neighbor was the Indiana State Policeman tasked with patrolling our particular segment of the famous Lincoln Highway and since I was always mowing his grass and doing other favors for him I had a pass from being ticketed for speeding) and you pulled up behind this car you recognized as a buddy’s and lo and behold look who is sitting close to him, just your long-time girlfriend.

Since none of us carried guns or cattle prods there was only one way to get out our aggression before stopping this miscreant so you could either beat him up or get beaten up yourself; you guessed it, flip that stoplight switch and blind the dork and your cheating heart girlfriend! His first inclination is that a policeman was behind him and he’d obviously done something wrong.

Chances are he’ll pull over to see “what’s wrong, Officer.” Imagine the shock on his and his new hussy’s face when they saw it was you instead of Patrolman Marv Reed. I still bear scars from guys who pulled this crap on me.

Some stoplights even had rearview mirrors on them, which was pretty cool if you wanted a panoramic view of what’s behind you. Also, depending on how much money you spent on them, in a very short amount of time your super-cool chrome spots would become rust pots sticking out of your vehicle’s A-pillar. (Even in the Mesozoic Era you got what you paid for.)

As time wore on, however, the practice of installing spotlights — baby spots or otherwise — was another good idea that stopped having relevance. Now many police vehicles are sans spotlights to maintain that “innocent” car look. (Of course how “unmarked” of a car can a Ford Crown Victoria that has so many antennae sticking out of it that it looks like a four-wheeled porcupine?)

Just remember the next time you see a car with spotlights — whether it’s a municipal vehicle or not — that at one time in our history that was one of the two most dangerous things one had to look out for. The other was Tyrannosaurus Rex dung.