Long shot - Steve McQueen's Ferrari license plates...

[Matt Bacon]

I'm on the home straight with the 275 NART Spider, and I'm just wondering if anyone has any idea what plates it wore when Steve McQueen owned it? In the book (McQueen's Machines) it has New York plates, but I think that's a more recent photo. Do cars in the US keep the same plates for life, or do they get re-registered by new owners in new states? I guess if it was imported by Chinetti, it would have arrived in New York, so it may have been registered there, but I guess I was expecting it to have California license plates... anyone know for certain? Otherwise I'll just do it with the NY plates in the photo, and hope no one tells me any different later!

bestest,

M.

[highway]

Do cars in the US keep the same plates for life, or do they get re-registered by new owners in new states?

I can at least answer that part of your question for you Matt, and the plain simple answer is NO.

We do things much differently here "across the pond" than you do. None of our cars come from the factory with license plates, each state does their own and not only do the plates get reregistered if the car is sold, we must renew our plates each year. With the renewal process, the plate stays the same, but if it is sold to another onwer, regardless of in the same state or not, the plate will change. Even if the vehicle is not sold, but the registration expires for a long period of time, the same owner may have to reregister a vehicle and get another plate. I had this happen personally with my pickup that is sitting in my driveway right now.

I have owned it since 2003, and this was the plate I received from the state of West Virginia after I had purchased it.

It sat in my driveway from late 2005 to late 2008 for mechanical reasons I just seemed to lazy to get around to until my better half's car decided it was going to go to the big junkyard in the sky and the truck was the cheaper of the two to fix. In that time I let the registration expire and first thing I had to do before I started driving it again in 2008 was get a new plate, the one it still wears today.

Also, for the piece of junk still sitting beside my truck, if I were to spend the money to fix everything wrong, I would have to get new plates for it since it's registration ran out in 2009. When the plates are renewed each year here, we just get a new sticker for the corner of the plate with the year it expires. Here is a pic of the car's plate with the expired 2009 sticker.

One other item to note, each state does the renewal process differently, some go by the registered owner's birthdate, West Virginia uses the first digit of the license plate number as a renewal date, and the plate expires the first day of that month. In the example of the car's old plate, it expired on July 1st, 2009, since the first number on the plate is 7. In the case of specialized plates such as a commerical plate, which my pickup wears a form of, all of the commercial plates expire on July 1st also, and personalized plates expire on January 1st.

Sorry I can't be of more help on the specific plate you're looking for, but at least it may give you a better understanding of how we deal with license plates here in the states.

[Jon Cole]

I suspect you already have this pic, as you made reference to the NY plate...

If you cannot find a pic of the original plate, odds are, neither will anyone else. Hope that makes your choice a little easier.

[sjordan2]

I haven't seen it, but there's a book called "McQueen's Machines" which has about 5 pages on his NART Spyder, as shown in the index. It may have some pictures showing the plates when he owned it, but I don't know for sure.

The chassis number is 10453.

Here's part of a review of the book from velocetoday.com...

"...the NART Spyder is probably the star of the stars. The car itself was the brainchild of Luigi Chinetti Jr., who figured that the 275GTB/4 would make a great soft top. Chinetti was right on the money, as after Sergio Scaglietti was done with it, the 275 GTS/NART was better looking that the rather bulbous coupe from which it sprang. The first Spyder, chassis 09437 was used in the making of the original †Thomas Crown Affairâ€, which is where McQueen first laid eyes on it. He fell hard and ordered one, chassis 10453 from Chinetti. Typically, he was not happy with the shade of blue and sent it to Lee Brown for a repaint. A few days after it got out of the body shop, it was heavily rear ended by a truck. According to Marcel Massini, there wasn’t an undamaged panel on the car. Currently the McQueen Spyder resides in New York."

Edited June 25, 2011 by sjordan2

[Matt Bacon]

Thanks, Matt, Jon and Skip... I have the book, and the picture above is one of the two of McQueen's NART Spyder in it. As the review says it "currently resides in New York," and I guess those are the New York plates in question...

all the best,

M.

[Darin Bastedo]

Lacking accurate reference I would simply put the wrong ones on the car, and enter it in a contest. soon enough some know it all will tell you the right one.

truthfully though, I'm a huge Steve McQueen Fan and have thoroughly researched many of his cars. I don't think that info is available lacking a california records search, That said, If I don't know and most of the people on this board don't know, it's a safe bet nobody knows, so i would simply go with the correct vintage of california plate move on. If later the correct Plate # becomes available it's an easy detail to fix.

[Aaronw]

I can at least answer that part of your question for you Matt, and the plain simple answer is NO.

With the renewal process, the plate stays the same, but if it is sold to another onwer, regardless of in the same state or not, the plate will change.

That really shows how different the states are. In California, the plates remain with the vehicle as long as it remains in the state unless there is another reason to change the plates (vanity plates, plates get stolen, restraining order etc).

You can even use older plates if you have a matched set and they are appropriate to the age of the vehicle. California has changed the plate style a few times over the years, so it has become fairly common for owners of antique cars to buy a matched set of original plates in the style that would have been on the car new then get the car registered under that plate number.

Edited June 26, 2011 by Aaronw

[highway]

That really shows how different the states are. In California, the plates remain with the vehicle as long as it remains in the state unless there is another reason to change the plates (vanity plates, plates get stolen, restraining order etc).

You can even use older plates if you have a matched set and they are appropriate to the age of the vehicle. California has changed the plate style a few times over the years,...

Yes Aaron, that is a good example of the different state laws. Here in WV, the last time they changed the style of the plates was in the mid to late 90s, when they dropped the state background from our plates and went with the plate now. When they did the change, all the old plates had to be replaced.