Rick Kretschmer's License Plate Archives

University of Maryland

我是一个骄傲Marylan大学的毕业生d, which makes me a Terp. Maryland's sports teams are called theTerrapins, or "Terps" for short. A terrapin is a type of turtle. Yeah, I know, turtles are not known for their prowess or fearsomeness. I've heard all the jokes already. As far as I know, University of Maryland special interest plates are issued only by the states of Maryland and Virginia. The Virginia plate shown at left is also a vanity plate.

I have a couple of pages from a Maryland MVA document that lists the number ranges and the state agencies to which state-owned vehicle plates are assigned. From this document, I know that the two full-sized plates shown immediately above were used on state vehicles assigned to the University of Maryland's main campus in College Park. State-owned motorcycles not used by law enforcement agencies with their own plates were issued regular motorcycle plates, since there was no state government motorcycle plate type at the time. The motorcycle plate shown above is one such plate; see itsregistration card. The University of Maryland Campus Police used motorcycles bearing regular plates while I was a student there in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

East Carolina University

"East Carolina" may sound like a made-up, fictitious place, but East Carolina University is a state university located in Greenville, North Carolina, obviously located in the eastern part of the state. Its sports teams are called thePirates. To paraphrase the bumper sticker, "My kid and my money went to ECU." Actually, my son has two degrees from ECU, only one of which I paid for. Living in North Carolina, I'm able to send the state even more money in order to obtain ECU license plates for my own vehicles. To the best of my knowledge, ECU specialty plates are offered only by the states of North Carolina and Maryland.

North Carolina now offers motorists a choice of three different standard plate designs,First in Flight, First in Freedom,andIn God We Trust. And so any specialty plate type that was offered on theFlightbase is now offered on all three. There were several different versions of ECU plates made on theFlightbase, but only the current version with the skull and crossbones has been made on the two newer bases.

Pennsylvania State University

A close family member and a few extended family members graduated from Penn State, and, my extended family all being from Philadelphia, there are a lot of Penn State fans among them. Penn State sports teams are called theNittany Lions. Mount Nittany is the name of a mountain near the Penn State campus, and so essentially a "Nittany" lion is a mountain lion who lives on Mount Nittany. A number of east coast states issue Penn State specialty license plates.

Penn State and the University of Maryland are now rivals in the Big 10 Conference, but decades ago when I was a student at Maryland and the Terps were in the ACC, we played Penn State annually in a non-conference football game, and we considered them to be our biggest rivals. Nevertheless, due to my family connections, Penn State has always been my second-favorite college sports team.

Baltimore Orioles – American League, Major League Baseball

I've been an Orioles fan my entire life. I can't say that about any other sports team. I was born and raised in Maryland, and as a kid, I followed baseball more than any other sport. I've been to more Orioles games than those of any other sports team, college or pro. Even when I lived in California, I would go to see them when they played the Oakland A's.

Maryland organizational plates are difficult for collectors to obtain, and so I don't have a real Orioles license plate. Normally, samples of Maryland organizational plates are even more difficult, but I managed to be in the right place at the right time and was able to get this sample Orioles plate.

Washington Redskins / Football Team / Commanders – National Football League

As a kid living in the Baltimore area, I was of course a Baltimore Colts fan. But just as I became a teenager, I moved to a town halfway between Baltimore and Washington, D.C. However, the kids in my new town were nearly all Redskins fans, and that was back when the Redskins were getting into Super Bowls and the Colts were pretty awful. So, my allegiance shifted to the Redskins. And then when the Colts snuck out of town in the middle of the night to move to Indianapolis in 1984, that settled it. By the time the Ravens came along, I had moved away from Maryland, and so I never became a fan.

Today, with the Ravens in Baltimore, pretty much the entire state of Maryland is predominately Ravens fans, except for the two counties immediately adjacent to Washington, D.C. That despite the Redskins' stadium actually being located in Maryland. By contrast, the entire state of Virginia is considered Redskins territory.

You'll notice that I still call the team the Redskins. I'm not being intentionally insensitive to those who find that name offensive, but they'll always be the Redskins to me. I'm really more of a fan of the Redskins in their glory days in the 1980s than I am of the current team, whatever it's called now.

St. Louis Cardinals – National League, Major League Baseball

My wife Debbie is similarly a lifelong Cardinals fan. She was born and raised in southern Illinois, just outside of St. Louis. St. Louis is a *big* baseball town, and they love their Redbirds there. And so I've adopted the Cards as my favorite National League baseball team. All Missouri specialty plates have vanity or personalized plate numbers, including this one. Illinois now also issues a St. Louis Cardinals plate.

Sacramento Kings – National Basketball Association

I lived in the Sacramento, California area for eight plus years, mostly in the 1990s. I never really had a favorite basketball team before I moved there. The Kings are Sacramento's only major league sports team, and college sports aren't much of a thing there, so they get a lot of media coverage. It's hard not to become a fan if you live there. California doesn't offer special interest plates for any pro sports team, so almost the only way to get a Kings-related license plate is to get a vanity plate. This one proudly proclaims that its owner is a KNGS FN, or Kings Fan.

However, I should point out that there's another California pro sports team called the Kings, the Los Angeles Kings hockey team of the NHL. The L.A. Kings began as an expansion team in 1967, while the NBA Kings came to Sacramento in 1985. California issued this style of plate, with the state name in red, embossed characters, between 1987 and 1993, so it could have been originally intended to show support for either team. But it doesn't matter; it's mine now, and I say it's a Sacramento Kings plate. With no expiration stickers, this plate was used on the front of the vehicle to which it was assigned.

Carolina Hurricanes – National Hockey League

The Carolina Hurricanes are an NHL team based in Raleigh, North Carolina. The old Hartford Whalers team moved to North Carolina in 1997 and changed their name, logo, and team colors. Similar to my Kings story abouve, I never really had a favorite hockey team before I moved to Raleigh in 2001. The Hurricanes are the Raleigh-Durham area's only major league sports team, and they're just about the only sports team, college or pro, that the entire region can get behind and root for. The Canes advanced to the Stanley Cup finals in 2002 and were Stanley Cup champions in 2006. The North Carolina DMV offers Carolina Hurricanes plates on all three of its standard backgrounds,First in Flight,First in Freedom, andIn God We Trust.