The world’s first parking meter is installed in Oklahoma City - July 16th, 1935

On this day in 1935, the first mechanical parking meters were installed in downtown Oklahoma City.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This Day in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio.
Hello and Welcome to This Day in History Class, a
show that discovers something new about history every day of
the week. I'm Gabe Lucier, and in this episode, we're
looking at one of the least popular breakthrough inventions of

(00:21):
all time, the undeniably practical, yet endlessly annoying parking meter.
The day was July sixteenth, nineteen thirty five, the first
mechanical parking meters were installed in downtown Oklahoma City. A

(00:43):
total of one hundred and seventy five of these so
called parcometers were placed and tested along fourteen blocks in
the city's business district. Simple and easy to use, the
meters consisted of a metal post with a built in
coinslot and a showing the amount of parking time remaining.

(01:03):
When first installed, a single nickel would buy the driver
a full hour of parking, and when the paid four
time ran out, a little flag would pop up to
indicate the meter had expired. Instead of running on electricity
or solar power, the initial design worked like a wind
up clock. Once a week, a city employee had to

(01:24):
wind each meter by hand to make sure it functioned.
Properly for the week ahead. Although never embraced by the public,
the paid to park system proved successful from a logistical
and financial standpoint, and the city was quick to add
more meters all over downtown. The man most responsible for

(01:44):
the parka meter was Carl C. McGhee, an Albuquerque reporter
who had risen to fame in the early nineteen twenties
by uncovering the infamous Teapot Dome oil field scandal. In
nineteen twenty seven, McGee moved from New Mexico go to
Oklahoma City in order to start up his own newspaper,
the Oklahoma News. The paper took off, and by the

(02:07):
early nineteen thirties, the editor had become a prominent figure
in his adopted hometown. He even served as a member
of the Chamber of Commerce's Traffic Committee, a body tasked
with finding a solution to the city's worsening traffic congestion problems.
Like many other urban areas at the time, Oklahoma City

(02:28):
was struggling to keep pace with the ever growing number
of automobiles crowding its streets. The city's downtown had a
limited supply of parking spaces, and there simply weren't enough
to accommodate business owners, their employees, and a steady flow
of paying customers. The city tried to combat this problem

(02:48):
by placing time limits on parking. Traffic police would mark
tires with chalk, note the time, and then dole out
tickets to any car left in a space for too long.
Worked well enough, but it required officers to make hourly rounds,
which pulled them away from their regular beats. After receiving

(03:08):
numerous complaints from downtown business owners and ticketed drivers, the
Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce agreed to look into the
parking problem. In nineteen thirty two, Carl McGee was appointed
chairman of the Traffic Committee, and after a good deal
of thought, he came up with a revolutionary idea, a
machine that charges drivers money to park. McGee champion the

(03:32):
parking meter is a win for everyone. The machine enforced
time limit would prevent people from occupying a space all
day long. Either a driver would pay more in order
to park longer, which earned money for the city, or
else they would move along once their time was up,
thus clearing the way for another customer. And if a

(03:53):
driver didn't leave when their time expired, they risked getting
a twenty dollars ticket, which of course would also put
money in the city's pocket. The Chamber of Commerce signed
off on the idea, and McGee spent the next several
years trying to bring it to fruition. He rigged up
a crude model in nineteen thirty two and filed for

(04:13):
a patent, but since he wasn't an engineer himself, McGee
partnered with the Oklahoma State University Engineering Department to help
refine his concept. Together, they organized a design contest and
offered a cash prize to any student who designed a
workable parking meter. The challenge proved to be a tall order, though,

(04:34):
thanks to the project's strict requirements. The device had to
be cost effective for mass manufacturing, but it also had
to be durable enough to hold up to vandalism and
harsh weather. In the end, none of the student's entries
were deemed viable, so in nineteen thirty three, McGee enlisted
the help of Oklahoma State professor Holger George Thusen and

(04:57):
an OSU engineering graduate name Samed Gerald A. Hale. The
pair created all the interior parts for their prototype meter,
which they dubbed the Black Maria an old slang term
for a police wagon. They hired a local plumber to
fashion the meter's exterior casing, and by the end of
the year, thusen Hale and McGhee began hunting for a manufacturer.

(05:23):
They eventually found one in Tulsa, and in early May
of nineteen thirty five, the first working model was put
on public display. People's reaction to the concept was divided,
to say the least. Merchants and city officials praised what
McGee was now calling the parcometer, but local residents denounced

(05:43):
the idea of paid parking, calling it un American and
arguing that it was effectively an unapproved tax on owning
a car. Despite this pushback, Oklahoma City moved forward with
its plans to install the meters on a trial basis
in the downtown area. The first batch was installed on
July sixteenth of that year on the southeast corner of

(06:06):
First Street and Robinson Avenue. The meters were placed at
twenty foot intervals along the curb and corresponded to painted
spaces on the pavement at a rate of just five
cents per hour. The parking meters were fairly affordable and
an absolute bargain by today's standards. Still, there were plenty
of complaints in even a few strange protests against them.

(06:29):
For example, one man rode his horse into town and
proceeded to tie it to the pole of one of
the meters, though he did pay a nickel. Others made
the most of their rented space by setting up a
table in a parking spot and playing cards for an hour.
Most folks never came around the idea of paying for
parking spaces that had once been available for free, but

(06:52):
it was hard to argue with the improved traffic flow
or the new source of revenue for the city. In
the first year alone, Oklahoma City's parking meters generated more
than thirty five hundred dollars, enough to pay for a
new radio system for the police department. Soon after, other
cities plagued by parking challenges were looking to invest in

(07:13):
meters of their own, and Carl McGee's newly formed Parcometer
Company was more than happy to supply them. By nineteen
thirty six, parking meters had spread to a dozen cities
across Oklahoma, Kansas, and Texas, and by the early nineteen
forties there were more than one hundred and forty thousand
of them operating nationwide. Over the years, the design of

(07:38):
parking meters has changed to varying degrees depending on the
town or city. Most physical meters now accept credit card
payments in addition to coins, though in either case their
rate is going to be much higher than a nickel
an hour. Many cities, including Oklahoma's capital, have retired their
mechanical meters altogether in favor of a diday'll pay by

(08:01):
plate system. So while parking meters themselves may soon disappear
from the urban landscape, the original intent behind them is
here to stay, much to the disappointment of drivers everywhere.
I'm Gay, Blues Gay, and hopefully you now know a
little more about history today than you did yesterday. If

(08:25):
you'd like to keep up with the show, you can
follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram at TDI HC Show,
and if you have any comments or suggestions, feel free
to send them my way by writing to this day
at iHeartMedia dot com. Thanks to Kasby Bias for producing
the show, and thanks to you for listening. I'll see

(08:45):
you back here again tomorrow for another day in History.
Class