Stop! – The History of the Stop Sign

When you see old, rare film footage from any time prior to WWI–you’ll notice that in the shots of busy streets–people are shown going in every odd direction in their early automobile or horse and buggy. It seemed to be chaos theory at work in the flow of traffic during that time–even though there were street patrollers who directed people through by hand in some cities…if not accidentally run over. Give credit to people in Detroit, Michigan for coming up with a plan to create at least one road rule in 1915. By that time, automobiles were pretty much outdoing horse and buggy as the means of transportation in major cities. The thought of owners of early automobiles having free reign to jaunt anywhere around a city street might sound fun now in a time of rigid road laws–but a lot of accidents were being had in that early 1910’s period. Nobody really knows the exact reasons why Detroit decided to create the first stop sign. Nevertheless, picturing a massive pile of old jalopies and buggies after a collision in the middle of a Detroit street would probably give us a good idea.

That early stop sign was far and away from the type we see today. Their early stop signs were just locally produced by painting the word “Stop” in black on a white-painted piece of metal. It was more or less just a sign to make people think before thinking they decided to take a jaunt through that bumpy gravel road or see if they can cross a busy city street before that trolley collides with them. By the time WWI ended, though, the citizens of Detroit decided to form a committee to make it more of a serious sign in the flow of traffic. With that came the idea to make the sign an octagon shape so it would stand out more. This was the beginning of the psychological formations we associate with signs based on shape. And it’s interesting how America chose the octagon first before Europe decided to use the same shape for their stop signs.

What you also might find surprising is that the early stop signs (that soon snowballed into every other state starting in 1924) were yellow-colored with the “Stop” in black letters. The psychological response of going from thinking yellow means “Stop”–to later equating it to “Caution” is quite a leap. All it takes, apparently, is several decades to get people used to the difference. Most of my Gen-X generation equate the sign of yellow with speeding up in an intersection to avoid having to stop for a red light.

Once that yellow color was firmly established as the national procedure in stopping traffic–other committees around the country started working toward writing up manuals to give standards to road signs so the engineering behind their placements on roads would create a better response by drivers who were about to be inundated with them–even on rural roads. By the mid-20’s–The National Conference on Street and Highway Safety created a manual for the road and created standards for the design of all traffic signs. That’s when a sudden change occurred in the letters on a stop sign. With red letters on a yellow background–this country suddenly had the spark to equate stopping with the color red. Odd, considering in Pamplona, Spain–bulls there thought it meant “charge!”

Revisions in the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (or just having fun getting a psychological rise out of drivers)…

That above-titled manual became the standard manual for creating the look and design of all traffic signs in this country. And, yes, it’s interesting to note that there was a bit of a battle there between the committee backing this one and another who had their own ideas about the design of traffic signs. As with format wars, one had to give in–and the two joined forces as the Joint Committee on Uniform Traffic Control Devices before writing THE manual that set the pattern for what we see today.

According to the history of the manual–it’s been revised about nine times in the last 70 years–with eventual add-ons of reflective lettering in the late 30’s to producing a WWII-themed stop sign that might be collectible now. What prompted the Committee to finally agree on giving the stop sign a red background with white lettering in 1954 hasn’t been reported (what national committee publicly reports the hows and whys behind things?)–but it was a smart move during a time when cars were starting to have the capability to speed well beyond the speed limits. The color red in America truly does garner a reaction of paying attention or alerting you to something that could pose danger. Who’s to say it wasn’t the fear of the Reds (Communists) during the McCarthy era in the early 50’s that prompted the decision to make stop signs that color?

While a wild thought–it would have been interesting to be a fly on the wall and hear the meetings with the committee when brainstorming to come up with a more effective sign to make people stop at intersections.

The stop sign internationally…

What might surprise a lot of people is that most of Europe appears to have adopted our octagon shape with the stop sign. Many have attempted to go their own way (Israel does have a variation on the octagon shape by having a white on red pattern)–but the Europe Union managed to make the stop sign a universal color and shape worldwide to avoid confusion.

The only country that’s defied the octagon shape is Japan. That’s not surprising since they’ve always been known to have simpler shapes to their traffic signs. In their case, their stop sign is an upside-down red triangle (the same shape as our “Yield” signs) and the “Tomare” in the middle for “Stop” in white letters.

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It’ll be interesting if we ever evolve into a different color for the stop sign. After 55 years using red as of this writing–that probably won’t happen…unless black (with red letters) becomes the new ominous way to get people to pay attention to the road when they frequently don’t nowadays.