On this day in 1901, New York became the first state to require license plates on cars, using the owners’ initials instead of numbers. There was a catch, though – the state didn’t issue plates, so drivers were expected to create them on their own. So early license plates varied considerably, with people commonly using metal, wood, leather, or just painting the letters directly on their cars. As the number of cars increased on the road, a problem became clear – there were too many people who had the same initials! And so our modern license plate was created. Massachusetts was the first state to issue plates. Theirs were made of iron and covered with porcelain enamel. Pennsylvania was the first state to offer vanity plates in 1931, but drivers could only add their initials to the plate. Today, a tenth of all vanity plates in the U.S. are in Virginia (1.6 million!), giving it the highest concentration of vanity plates issued by a state. Learn more in the audio below.