When did people start using car seats?

[Jaimee]

DS 6 asked me last week if he could sit in the front seat of the car. I said no of course, and that started me thinking. He's never been in the front seat of a car(and won't until he's much older)...when I was a kid (born in '75) the front seat was a hot commodity I remember riding with my cousins, or friends families, WALKING around in the back of a van while it was moving...or sitting in the way back of my best friends parent's Brady Bunch station wagon on long trips. I can also remember holding my little cousin on my lap when she was a baby. I'm sure there were car seats then, but I don't remember seeing them often. So when did start being used commonly?

 

[Dan Murphy]

Well, not sure when they started in use, Jamiee, but I do know Vince was born in '77 and we took him home in a car seat. When I think back to how we grew up, in the 50's, it is remarkable more did not die. But I suppose they did, just not the communication we have today to tell people about it. Hey, Isaiah, stay in the back, leave the driving to mommy.

 

[Kermit]

I was born in 1975, too. My mom said that they had a car seat for me, but it wasn't seatbelted into the car. It just hooked over the back of the seat. They were basically used to keep the baby from crawling all over the place--not to make the baby safer. We didn't even wear seatbelts until I was about 7 years old or so.

 

[Sonya]

ditto what kermit said, but I was born in 1971.

I remember playing on the floor of my dad's truck next to the stick shift!

 

[Robmom]

I was born in 1968 and we never wore seatbelts let alone use a carseat. My DD cannot sit in the front seat and she's 11. She sits in the back with seatbelt. It's hard for me to put it on sometimes because I'm so used to not wearing one. But I do it because it's the law.

 

[Poohbear123]

I was born in 1958, and NEVER used a seat belt, untill my Mom bought a 1950's vehicle that had seat belts in the back seat---never used them, but they were there. My DD and DS were born in 1981 and 1982 and we did NOT have car seats for them--the law was passed here I think in 1984! When my DD had her baby in Oct. she had to HAVE a car seat, and the nurse followed them to the car to make sure they had one!

 

[disykat]

I was babysitting a lot in the late 70's. It seems to me in the mid 70's the kids were wandering around the car, but by about '78 they were buckled into car seats. I remember a mom commenting about how much her daughter hated the car seat and that her brother who was only a few years older had never used one.

 

[Chattyaholic]

My DS was born in '76 and DD in '78 and we did not have car seats for them. In fact, in '77 we took my parents with us on a road trip to Texas to visit Dad's family and had a van. The front had two captain chairs, and the middle was empty, and the back had a couch. DH and Dad sat up front, Mom and I on the couch and DS who was barely a year old was in his playpen in the center. I shudder to think what could have happened, if we'd had an accident on that long trip. I don't think we even had seatbelts in the van then.

Now, with grandchildren, they are buckled in the back. My grand-daughter will be 11 in August and she still sits in back, she won't "graduate" to the front until she's 13.

 

[Meriweather]

My oldest was born in 1979 and always was in a car seat and has always worn a seat belt.
My children did ride in the front seat when older, but that was before air bags.

I don't remember having seat belts in a car until the 60's and then we seldom wore them.

 

[JetMom]

My little brother was born in '71 and I remember my mom having one of the car seats that sat in the middle of the front seat and hooked over the seatback.

When I was born in'66 my mom had a carriage that came off of its wheels and sat on the backseat as a "carbed". Can you just imagine the baby just rolling around!! LOL

I always tell my mom it was a miracle any of us survived infancy!

My oldest DD was born in "92 and the nurse followed us out of the hospital to be sure we had a carseat.

 

[damo]

I remember having no seatbelts as well. I also remember the two children down the street who were all killed in a car accident when they flew through the front window after hitting a moose. Their dad was killed as well, leaving the poor mother to cope. The dad probably would have survived with an air bag and the kids as well if they had been buckled up. Makes me so glad to have those modern safety devices!

 

[C.Ann]

My youngest was born in 1972 - only the "hook over the front seat" car seats then..

By the time "real" car seats (and infant seats) were on the scene my kids were to old for them..

Now that I think about it - how did we survive? When I was a kid I was big on riding on that "shelf" under the back window.. Shudder the thought!

 

[minniecarousel]

My older DS was born in '79 and he came home in a carseat. I always cringed when I saw kids not riding in carseats when he was in pre-school. It wasn't yet a law, but I felt that parents should have known that it was the safest way. Mine also sat in the front at times, but that was before airbags. My 12 year-old nephew still gets in the backseat, even though he really is big enough to sit in the front.