Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
why lots of kids ride Dirt Bikes, Go-karts and ATV's at that age and back then it would of been no different since most of the Roads back then would be Dirt Roads and a modern 125cc Dirt Bike would have more power then a car back then.
Plus lots of kids still grow up and work on family farms an drive tractors and farm vehicles today so not really that big of deal back then IMO
Exactly.
My three year old can ride a dirt bike. She just started standing up on the pegs last week.
My six year old daughter can jump her moto.
An eight year old has the ability to be a better technical driver that 99.99% of the adults on the road. But they lack some judgment and maturity. But then again so do a lot of adults.
Edsel Ford, a gift from his father Henry Ford, got his own car at 8 year of age and drove himself to and from school with it, with the absence of a legal minimum driving age. And he spent hours tinkering in the workshop his father equipped for him, filling his schoolbooks with drawings of cars.
Hey! What's wrong with that!!!
And by age 10? Driving from Dearborn into Detroit to have lunch with his father?
Source: Ford, The Men and the Machine by Robert Lacey
There were no other cars on the road yet lol hence no laws , plus the speed, hard to kill yourself
Edsel Ford was born in 1893, making it 1901 when he was 8 years old.
Driving a 1901 Ford is a lot different than a modern car. I don't think the Ford Horseless Carriage could break 20MPH at all and the amount of cars on the road was pretty much limited to upper class at that point. So a car was a rare thing.
Not saying letting an 8-year old drive is right, but not like he had a 400HP Mustang at his disposal and commuting down I-90. He just had an opportunity at the right time in history.
This. If we only had 77 million people in the country still, with only a tiny percentage having access to cars (much less using them every day for every thing), that all go less than 20 miles per hour, then, sure, after properly training them (and only if the said 8 year old in question was of the more serious nature and not of the dare devil variety. I have one of each). The ability to go 100 miles plus with power steering and constant traffic? Hell no.
I've let a 10 year old drive.. In my truck while I was in there with him, on my property.
No big deal. I wouldn't ever think about letting him get out on public highways or getting up above 20mph or so.
Of course.. I remember, and i'm sure many others have the same story.. Sitting in my dad's lap at 5 or 6 years old, and him letting me 'drive' the car by holding the wheel while he worked the pedals. And this was actually on public roads. before the mandatory seat belt laws.
I wouldn't, and think it was almost as foolish then as it would be now.
Far less foolish then to me. There were less cars/traffic, roads didn't allow for high speeds, cars didnt go as fast. It was a whole different thing than.
On today's roads it would not be the same as back then. In the 50's a buddy of mine drove his family car at the age of 12 because both of his parents were paralyzed and he was the only means of transportation they had. He looked a little older and the local cops knew the family situation and looked the other way.
My great-grandchildren were whizzing around on their large lawns on 4-wheelers when they were younger than 8. It was not even fun watching as they would get too close to one another. Seems to me it was something the Ford boy could do or he wouldn't have been allowed to do it and a Model T was very different from a contemporary automobile. I was 12 when I learned to drive, but even by the next year there were gaps in my knowledge. lol
That car had like 20hp and topped out at 30mph. That's a lot different than letting an eight year old drive a modern car with 350hp and a top speed of 180mph.
Given how few cars there were back then and how slow they went, it's not a big deal. I've seen lawnmowers move faster than the original cars did. Plenty of kids on tractors around here and they all go about as fast.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
