I found my old 1970 California 1H.... Blue and Yellow Plates!

[Tom Colitt]

I know that owners of 1969 and older Black plates can re-register their cars with the correct original plates that came on their cars, but does this apply to 1970 as well? I even have the old registration from the previous owner to go with it. I'm told there was an article in Hemming's online that recently talked about this. Does anyone have any more information on this or experience?.......

[49er]

Here is link to an auto week article. The second link shows where the bill's progress in Sacramento.

http://www.autoweek.com/article/20120328/carnews01/120329845

http://legiscan.com/gaits/view/398321

John

[66andBlue]

... and here is the Hemmings article: http://blog.hemmings.com/index.php/2012/03/26/california-considers-the-return-of-black-license-plates/

[Tom Colitt]

Thanks guys. This new plate program is obviously not intended for people like us, since the plates will only slightly resemble the old Blue and yellow plates. Meanwhile I have bought up a bunch of original Blue plates and figured out that a plate with 6 digits and the letters A through D would have been correct for my 1970 Pagoda...

I do have another question. So, if I registered a car new in March of 1970, I would have had a 1970 year sticker on my plate. I always thought the year sticker was the expiration date. Why, then does DMV want the year sticker on the YOM program to correspond to the license plate model year of the car?....

[49er]

 Hello Tom, Not sure if this answers your question or not but I will give it a try. California used to issue new plates every 6 years or so. The "Black plates" were first issued in 1963 and "63" was stamped into the plate. As I recall, the yearly re-registration was required Jan 1 of each year and a new sticker with the appropriate year was issued and placed on right side of the plate. In 1970, the 1st "Blue Plates" were issued and at that time it was decided to not reissue new plates for all cars and start the registration year from the date the car was sold and month sticker was applied to the left side of the plate. For cars that still had the old black plates, new re registration dates were spread out over a 12 month span so even though my car was first registered in Sept 1968, my renewal now comes up in March every year and have to apply new yearly stickers every year since. Every six years or so, I carefully peel away the layers of old stickers. They would be an inch thick by now if I didn't:-)

Hope this makes sense.

John

 BTW, My family purchased a new car in January 1971 in LA area and the last three letters, on the blue plate,  were CJT

[66andBlue]

John,
just a minor correction about the yellow/black plates. I believe it started out with the 1963 sticker placed on the left side, the 64 sticker on the right (over the embossed 1963 mark) and so on. See photo as an example.
Tom,
you'll have real fun getting your old yellow/blue plates registered.  Make sure you make an appointment at your DMV office of choice otherwise you'll sit there for a very long time. Even with an appointment it will take time since very few DMV employees are familiar with the YOM process.  Also be prepared that they'll keep your current plates and you get a temporary (90 days) paper license until Sacramento sends you the new stickers for the old plates - which can take a looong time requiring you to go back to the office and request an extension of the paper license. That  will send the unhappy employee again into a dizzy because normally extensions are not granted! 
And if the 1970 sticker on your old plate is a reproduction and the number on it is already in the file - or was made up - then you can sell your plates again on eBay and start a new process. 

[49er]

Hello Alfred, When the Black plates were first issued, there was no sticker attached. The first picture shows my '30 Model A Ford taken in 1963. From there on,  the year sticker was always placed on the right. 2nd picture (of my 250 SL) was taken in December 1967, The third (of my 280SL) taken in June 1969 and the last picture taken a couple of years ago (with the month sticker).

John

[mchokhdar]

Hey guys, I have the blue plate number on my car now, how can I get the black and yellow one?

[66andBlue]

Why would you want one?
What year is your car? (Please consider adding this information to your "signature" in all your posts - it helps answering your questions)

[49er]

Alfred, my apologies. After digging a bit more I found a photo taken in 1973 which clearly (almost) shows a 1972 sticker on the right and the '73 sticker on the left. I do know that some time between '73 and '76 California went to the Month sticker on the left. My memory isn't as good as it used to be:-(

John

[66andBlue]

Hi John,
no apologies required - I did not know that in 1963 no stickers for the yellow/black plates were required although they were issued that year for valid older plates.
This YOM program is very confusing!

[mdsalemi]

Why would you want one?

I agree on this...unless you have had your car continuously from that black plate era, and have the original plate for the car, I don't see the charm.  Must be some kind of California thing?  California has had much prettier plates over the years than the utility black and yellow. Few of the license plates of that era (from any of the 50 states) are much to look at.  I just don't get it...but know it is some big deal to have them.

[tobacco]

To help narrow Tom's search, I'll try to upload my original Pagoda plate from mid-April 1971.  I believe all plates arrived in the mail through Sacramento, and they were issued in strict alpha order, so that eliminates any original-issue D plates and most of the Cs for Tom's '70 SL.   While Michael's justified to say most license plates are forgettable, the California Blue Plate was different -- a rich color, and a finish that responded to polish and wax almost as well as the car's finish did.

[49er]

Hello Bill,
 After reading your post I went back and checked our records and discovered the car that had the blue plate (320 CJT) was purchased in January '71 so I would imagine there might have been a few "C" plates issued in late 1970. I know all the plates back then were made by inmates at the Folsom prison but not sure if they were all sent out directly to the registered car owners. It seemed that you could spot  patterns to the letters/numbers depending on where you were geographly in the state.

John

[Alan Smithee]

I agree on this...unless you have had your car continuously from that black plate era, and have the original plate for the car, I don't see the charm.  Must be some kind of California thing?  California has had much prettier plates over the years than the utility black and yellow. Few of the license plates of that era (from any of the 50 states) are much to look at.  I just don't get it...but know it is some big deal to have them.

Period-correct CA 6-digit black plates look far better on a Pagoda than current-issue reflectorized 7-digit white plates showing the CA DMV website address.  Surprised anybody would think differently, regardless of what state you are in...not unlike the difference in appearance between a modern head unit in the dashboard vs. an original Becker or Blaupunkt (they certainly aren't in demand for their sound quality).

I recently went through the CA YOM program to get 1969 plates on my 1969 SL, and while it was a PITA, it looks great.

[bjudd]

Here's the order form for the "Legacy License Plates".

http://apps.dmv.ca.gov/forms/reg/reg17L.pdf

The FAQ section on the following page answers all the questions I had:

http://www.dmv.ca.gov/legacyplates/faqs.htm

They will be issued after Jan. of 2015 only if they receive 7,500 pre orders. 

[Tom Colitt]

Thanks Bill and John

I'm sticking to the A series plates that I've been buying up on ebay for my 1970 (built in 1969) Pagoda. Let's see if they'll let me hand the numbers in as a personalized plate request without a real good justification for the request. One number I have is 969 ALA and from what I understand the puritans in Sacramento even have a problem with anything containing "69".... Too bad Arnold isn't still there. I'm sure he would have no issues with the number.... (I also have one containing ALS, but I'm afraid I'd have to prove that I have ALS to be granted the plate)