The Family Car, 1947

When we lived at 338 N. Pine, Larry, Sr. had an old 2-seater car with a rumble seat.  It is believed that this car is a 1934 Pontiac, three window coupe.   Larry, Jr. and Elaine would ride in the open-air seat while Helen and Larry Sr. were inside.  Sometimes we would get rained on while we were riding around.  Looking at it today, it certainly is a magnificent looking automobile!

For those of you who don't know what a rumble seat was, Wikipedia offers the following explanation:

A rumble seat is an upholstered exterior seat which hinges or otherwise opens out from the rear deck of a pre-World War II automobile, and seats one or more passengers.  Roadster, Coupe and Cabriolet auto body styles were offered with either a luggage compartment or a rumble seat in the deck. Models equipped with a rumble seat were often referred to as a sport coupe or sport roadster. 

In America, this type of seating became largely obsolete in the mid-1930s when cars became too fast and streamlined for the comfort of passengers in such a seat. Their popularity was further diminished by frequent injuries, including decapitation that sometimes occurred in accidents. Rumble seat passengers were essentially seated out in the elements, and received little or no protection from the regular passenger compartment top.  It is possible that the last American-built cars with a rumble seat were the 1939 Ford and 1939 Dodge and Plymouth.  Prior to World War I, a single, center-mounted rumble seat was sometimes referred to as a mother-in-law seat.

I wonder if putting children in a rumble seat today would be considered "child abuse?"  The times were certainly much more simple in the 1940s.

Photo courtesy Elaine Beaudoin from the photo collection of Helen McIntyre.