Many years ago, the small-town high school I attended had 3 or 4 "assemblies" each year.

[Atticus]

Some were entertaining and some were meant to inform. One in particular that I recall dealt with the dangers of speeding and reckless driving and encouraged the wearing of those new-fangled "seat belts". ( Yes, I am THAT old. ) The presenter went through a series of statistics about how we were more likely to be maimed or killed if we were in a high speed accident without a seat belt on.

Knowing how invincible we all felt and how none of us thought WE would ever need a silly seat belt, the guy uncovered a suitcase beside him, placed it on a table near the assembled student body and opened it. It was full of white medical capsules.

"There are 10,000 of these gelatin capsules in here," he began. "All but one contain harmless powdered sugar, but ONE----" he continued, pausing dramatically, "contains deadly strychnine, a poison so strong and quick acting that if someone were to swallow it, they'd be dead before an ambulance even got here." The gymnasium was totally silent.

"Is there anyone here who cares so little about their life that they'd be foolish enough to swallow any one of these?" he asked, stirring the suitcase full of identical capsules with his hand. "Here, the odds are 9,999 to one in your favor. Statistically, that's better odds than your chance of surviving a high speed head-on without a seat belt!"

Back then, no one wanted to swallow a capsule. Today, if Trump told them strychnine was a hoax------who knows?

[Walleye]

1. I remember the first seatbelts. I remember a state trooper. Who said people say they would rather be

Thrown free of the car in an accident. He said, I tell them, no you wouldn’t. That made an impression on me.

[leftieNanner]

2. I remember that too

I'm also really surprised that when someone's car breaks down on the freeway, they get out of the car and stand on the shoulder.

I think you would be safer staying in your car and waiting for AAA or a cop or something. If your car is hit, that's one thing. If YOU are hit, that's dead meat.

Am I wrong?

[Walleye]

5. You are so right. Don't change your tire.Some drivers have to run into something if they look at

[yonder]

6. My dad, at the urging of my mom, installed seatbelts in the '55 Chevy that was our family car.

This would have been about 1966 thereabouts. However, he rarely choose to wear them. When we asked him why not, he would say something like "Well, I have the steering wheel right here.... it'll stop me". Of course, dad was the smartest, biggest, strongest, best-at-everything person I knew at that age and had little reason to doubt him.

It wasn't that much later when I began to learn that his steering wheel/steering column "lifesaver" was actually responsible for much trauma and death in car accidents, especially if unbelted. Fortunately, he never got to find out if his theory was correct.

I'm sure, if he were still around, he would be a redhat wearing, anti-vaxxer.

[COL Mustard]

11. He Was Right.

The steering wheel would have stopped him, but I doubt he would've like the impact.

My Dad was the same way. "No gubmint gonna tell me I have to wear no seat belt." That worked until he backed the car into a light pole in the mall parking lot and looked like he'd been in a bar fight and lost. That was about 4 years before he died. He never had a problem with seatbelts after that.

[beveeheart]

23. I suffered chest trauma from a steering wheel/steering column in '66.

It was almost 6 months before I could stand to be hugged. You can be sure that I ALWAYS wear a seat belt and won't start the car until everyone is buckled up.

[Ocelot II]

3. Seat belts became standard in new cars when I was in my last year of high school,

but most cars still didn't have them. The deterrent against bad driving the school employed, usually shortly before prom night, was a film called "Signal 30," which was a compendium of gory car accidents featuring a lot of mangled bodies. It was horrifying (I couldn't look at a lot of it), but I don't know how effective it was because teenagers are infamously foolish and incapable of applying caution to their own behavior. Being a social leper I was never invited to a prom or anything else, and had neither a car nor a driver's license, so bad driving by other teenagers was not a particular concern of mine.

The strychnine capsule among the 1,000 harmless ones was a good example, but I'm not sure a creature as clueless as a teenager would have been capable of applying the lesson or overcoming peer pressure ("Seat belt? Don't be such a p*ssy!').

[scrabblequeen40]

9. Our video was "Red Asphalt" in Drivers Ed

I put off taking the class as long as I could -- I was a late bloomer and I was very anxious about driving. Red Asphalt gave me nightmares. Didn't drive for the first six months after i finally got my license. I was totally freaked out.

[ms liberty]

10. My HS drivers ed had films, too. I think there were three

All of them horrifying. One had a car about 15 ft in the air in a tree and the driver very injured, bloody and moaning.

[Ligyron]

16. Mechanized Death was a good one.

There were a few others. One had a state trooper picking up what looked like the results of an overturned meat counter. One shot of a section of ribs with scraps of clothing attached had some girls puking.

I can still picture that with some ill ease myself .

[hlthe2b]

4. I remember having to watch a very disturbing film on house fires--

Did they think we were all homegrown arsonists?

At any rate, while it talked about fire safety, the film depicted all or most of the members of a family dying and it was so grim, the point seemed to be missed... I was haunted by that for a long time thereafter.

Honestly, I think we missed all the drug talks (though maybe those were days I played hookey).

Yeah, we had deadly traffic accident sessions/films too, but I still remember the house fire film. Damn. It was grotesque.

[COL Mustard]

12. I Went To Jr. High And High School

With people who went to the drug talks for practical information. I hope they became (legal) pharmacists.

[Tadpole Raisin]

7. I remember those assemblies now that

You mention them and I remember ones (yearly?) that I think they also played a shocking film showing aftermaths of real accidents. Trying to scare us shitless I guess. I didn’t need any more convincing.

About ~ 10 years ago I saw a PSA on YouTube that really moved me with its simplicity. Embrace Life from Sussex safe driving. Here is the link. Sorry I don’t know how to embed it.

[tblue37]

21. Excellent. Thanks for sharing that!

[yonder]

24. Yes, that was very good and welcome to DU.

[AllaN01Bear]

8. im sure if tfg told them it was a hoax now theyd belive it.

how many of u remember this .
every so often the song gets stuck in my earworm player.

[COL Mustard]

13. You Sound Older Than Me.

I got that song stuck in my head a month or so ago.

[rickyhall]

14. I remember a film about the dangers of small cars in accidents.

Then 8 years later I was nearly killed when an idiot T-boned my VW.

[LiberalFighter]

15. It would help get rid of stupid people.

Tell them one has vodka.

[paleotn]

17. Same here. A local cop and a state trooper did ours....

on seat belts, speeding, reckless driver, etc. But invariably, a handful of my classmates didn't make it to their 1st year of college. Killed in traffic accidents as seniors and newly minted graduates. Several classes ahead of me and behind me, same story. 3, 4 or 5 died in and just out of high school. Sad.

[yardwork]

18. I went to a similar high school.

[tblue37]

19. Trump would rant about how strychnine is a miracle cure for covid that the US medical establishment

is denying Americans who desperately want and need it.

And GOP governors would spend millions stockpiling strychnine capsules.

[Chainfire]

20. The assemblies of my small rural high school usually involved

preachers and sermons. Everyone was required to attend. By the time I was a junior in H.S. I was on my way to be a confirmed atheist and I got a big dose of the ass for having to attend. (Our principal was also a fundamentalist preacher)

I do remember one that was all about the dangers of dope. (in '68, there was no dope in the school, if there had of been, I would have been the first to know) After the class, we crushed up some aspirins, rolled them up in cigarette cellophane and hid them around the school where the janitor was sure to find them. They brought in cops from the state capital to search the school and find the culprits. They took the stuff to the lab and had it tested. A lot of people ended up with egg on their face, but they never found the dopers.

[Mr.Bill]

22. I bought my first car in the last weeks of 1969.

It was a '57 Ford Fairlane Clup Coupe. Seat belts were available on '57 Fords, but were an option. My car did not have them. My dad took me over to look at the car a few miles from our house. I bought it, and on the way home I stopped at the auto parts store and bought seat belts. When I got home I installed them before I drove the car again. That ride to the auto parts store was the first and last time I drove without seat belts.