Things an old guy does for fun on a Friday night!
It's been a long work-week, and it's not over 'til sometime after 5 PM tomorrow; so I'm spending my "wild Friday night" on the computer; looking at StangNet and researching answers to questions.
1.) "Black Plates" From 1963 to 1969: License plates issued to California vehicles from the years 1963 through 1968 had a solid black background, with "gold" (Yeah, it looks like yellow to me, too!) letters/numbers. Also of note, 1963 was
the last year that California instituted a "total re-issue" of license plates; vehicles that were
not re-registered in another state or did not enter into California after 1JAN1969 continued to wear their "black and gold" plates, even though California went to "blue and gold" plates in 1969. Therefore, if the car never left California until it was imported into your country, it is likely that the black and gold plates are the original plates issued to your Mustang when it was first sold.
***NOTE: There have been efforts to re-write California legislation such that, should one find the correct plates for a vintage car's "Year of Manufacture", one could - for an extra fee, of curse - use those vintage plates to register the car in California. I am unaware of the results of those efforts.
THIS THREE YEAR OLD THREAD FROM ANOTHER FORUM may better explain things for you.
2.)Registration "stickers": In most states, the Division of Motor Vehicles issues these stickers to indicate that the owner has annually renewed the registration on that vehicle. Annually, "you pay your money and get your sticker". Should you not renew your registration; you're now driving around with "expired" stickers; whose incorrect coloration/markings indicate that you are
illegally driving around with expired registration and the "expired" coloration/markings help law enforcement officers to easily know which car to pull over and issue a citation for driving with said expired registration. And yes, one just slaps the new sticker over the old; "adding to the stack", as it were.
Ain't it grand?
EDIT: California is not the only American state to periodically change the color of its license plates; this lunacy is a
nationwide ocurrance. In my lifetime and in my own state of Arizona; I can remember my Dad's 1962 Ford Galaxie two-door "wearing" white-over-dark blue license plates. In 1966, the Galaxie was traded in on a 1966 Galaxie 500XL with 1966 "black over white" plates (I don't remember the "license numbers" on those cars - I was 4 years old when he bought the '66). The '66 was replaced with a 1971 Ford LTD Brougham that was registered with black-over-yellow "1969" plates (lettered"MGA-710"); but those plates were replaced in the 1973 "total re-issue" with green-over-gold plates - "SGG-580". My own 1973 Ford Gran Torino wore "TCS-280" in the green-over gold; and my 1972 Ford F100 pickup wore "TN-5280" - same coloration. 1973 was Arizona's last year for "total-re-issue", so those last vehicles had those plates well after the next "color change" in 1980.
Sometime around 2000, Arizona decided that "the plates stay with their owner"; so my 2002 F-150 wears the 1980 "white-over-dark red" plates first issued on my then-new 1991 Chevy Silverado pickup (with 20 "year stickers" stacked in the upper-right corner, easily a 1/4-inch high stack). As well, my wife's 2002 Dodge Ram 1500 pickup wears the white-over-dark red plates from her '94 Pontiac Grand Am. Yes, I left the license numbers off the last two vehicle listings because they're still on the road and still in my and my wife's names. As I get older and my country slides inexorably closer to total socialism; I find myself becoming more paranoid and more discreet with my public information!
But it's strange the things (like license numbers) that I can remember from 'my younger days'.
