Time Machines: the evolution of winter driving

This ad for a 1934 Hudson 8 illustrates the joys of winter driving, but it wasn’t always that much fun.

By Glen Woodcock

The evolution of winter driving

Being at the wheel of a rear-drive 2012 BMW 1 Series on a recent stormy day brought back a lot of memories. As it powered its way up a steep, snow-covered hill I watched the traction control light flick on and off. I was glad of such technology standing between me and the nearest snowbank.

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The BMW handled the poor conditions way better than the rear-drive cars of my youth, and the experience started me thinking about how we used to tackle winter roads without traction control, limited slip differentials or AWD on demand. Cars like my 1947 Frazer, now safely tucked away until spring, once slipped and skidded their way through all kinds of winter weather. If we were lucky, maybe there were two good snow tires on the rear wheels and the trunk carried a shovel and a bag or two of sand – both for the extra weight and emergency use on ice.

Driving a car in winter, even as recently as the 1960s, was a whole different experience – and one I’d rather not repeat. But on the whole it may have made us better drivers, because we had to be alert or we’d be trudging to the nearest phone booth to call for a tow truck. No OnStar or cellphones back then to bring help at the touch of a button.

Hands up everyone who ever had a RWD car slide into the ditch, instead of negotiating a curve, because the back end was too light, the bias-ply tires didn’t have enough grip and, maybe, it was going a little too fast.

Of course, that wasn’t all cars didn’t have back then. Front wheel drive was a novelty until the 1970s, while all-wheel drive was unheard of and 4WD typically was found only on Jeeps and some pickups until the 1980s.

Remember trying to make a panic stop on an icy surface in the days before anti-lock brakes? If you do, you also remember being out of control and maybe doing a complete 360 or two.

You don’t even have to be all that old to recall when rear window defoggers were a novelty. A lot of motorists also carried an ice scraper for use inside, as well as out, because the defroster wasn’t powerful enough to keep ice from your breath forming on the windshield.

And remember how some people had those plastic inserts from Canadian Tire stuck on their side windows to keep a peep hole free of frost?

Remember tire chains and studded tires – now illegal in many jurisdictions – or how fishtailing was a normal part of pulling away from a stop on a snow-covered road?

And if you’re really old, as a kid you remember riding in the back, bundled under the plaid blanket that hung from the rear of the front bench seat. You needed it, because no warmth from the underpowered heater ever made its way back there.

Remember hoping that weak six-volt battery would make a big V8 turn over when the temperature dipped down low? And then remember asking for a push or a boost to get it started? (You wouldn’t dare give anyone a push with today’s plastic bumpers.)

Worst of all, remember how your dad’s new car rusted out after five or six years of Canadian winters? At least today they’re built to last longer than that – even in places where road salt still is liberally spread at even the hint of snow or freezing rain.

And back in the day there were no amenities such as heated steering wheels, heated seats, heated side mirrors or heated windshield washer fluid. Heck, some cars didn’t even have windshield washers.

Yet we made it, despite the odd fender bender (in the days when that didn’t mean an automatic $2,000 bill from the body shop). Long live old cars, but let them rest peacefully in their heated garages until spring returns.

And God bless whoever invented AWD and traction control.

Tags: 1947 Frazer, 2012 BMW 1 Series, Canadian Tire, OnStar, Time Machines, winter driving