Tractors With Lugs Prohibited

Watching Jimmy Stewart, Donna Reed, Lionel Barrymore, Ward Bond, etc. in the 1946 movie It's A Wonderful Life has become a Christmas tradition for me.

Each time that I watch it I notice at least one thing that I have not noticed before.

This time I noticed the sign on the bridge from which George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) was planning to jump and commit suicide before his guardian angel (Henry Travers) intervened.

The sign said "Tractors With Lugs Prohibited."

Most likely the bridge where the film was made had a wooden floor in 1946 and local officals prohibited farm tractors with steel wheels.

It's A Wonderful Life remains one of my very most favorite movies.

Dean

I am a 1941 model, and I remember those signs of all the highways here in Mo.

Oh yeah we had them here also. Haven"t seen one in years

I have a pic of one still standing near Tuscon.

little town in Ohio Amish county where I grew up still has a sign up that saying the same thing.

and in Wisconsin.

Watched that movie tonits /and I did not See that ,,, Sure Gets Hard for a guy to Swallow toward the very End of " Its A Wonderful LIFE "

You should watch it on the big screen. I did for the first time this year. As Donna Reed was from Denison, Iowa they showed it at the Donna Reed theater there last week end. Good family fun.

Our version of the sign was "Road closed to sharp-shod animals and vehicles with lugs on wheels". The signs disappeared in the early '60's or thereabouts. Always wished I had gotten one before they disappeared.

I was given several of these signs, when our township cleaned their building out.

Dean, In Southern Illinois they read "Vehicles With Lugs Prohibited". The one sign that I remember was on an oil and chip road near our two room schoolhouse. I walked past it every day.

When I was a litle guy, I didn't realize the lugs were referring to the traction lugs on the old tractors. I thought it meant you had to have hubcaps to hide the lugnuts on cars and pickups. I breathed a little easier when I learned the meaning because our car had a hubcap missing. . .

Paul

I've seen the movie a dozen or more times but still choke up near the end everytime.

They simply do not make movies like It's A Wonderful Life anymore.

Dean

I too noticed that sign when I watched the movie this time, never saw that sign before. Guess am always watching to see if George jumps, hoping that one of these times he doesn't because the movie always ends the same. But you would think that by now after jumping into the ice cold river every year at this time and always having the movie end the same, that just one year George wouldn't jump, but he always does. Maybe he does it just so they can sneak some new stuff like that sign into the movie? Never know.

Hey, all joking aside, I listened to an interview a few years ago with the lady that played George's youngest daughter, Zuzu or Zazu, whatever...and she was talking about little things like that sign. One of the things she mentioned was the skull on old man Potter's desk, and sure enough, there is a skull on old man Potter's desk. I looked and looked until I finally saw it. Its there. And did you notice that when Nick the bartender gets mad at George and Clarence starts calling them "...pixies...", the camera pans out the window to the parking lot and there's Uncle Billy on a Johnny Popper yelling "Whoa Nellie" while having a pull off in the snowy bar parking lot with Bert the cop driving Ernie's cab? Did you ever catch that? OK, that part I made up, but it would have been pretty cool. But, the skull on old man Potter's desk is there.

Merry Christmas, and enjoy.

Mark

You could have gotten busted for indecent exposure. Your nuts were showing.

I'm more of a Chevy Chase Christmas Vacation type of movie guy.
The scene where he plugs in the Christmas lights and dims out the rest of the town. Then somebody throws the Aux Power switch at the Nuclear Plant. Thus bringing the town back on line.
Sorry but it's one of my favorite scenes.

I remember those signs in Ohio when I was growing up. I also remember "half paved roads" They paved only one lane to save money, the other lane was gravel. Everyone drove on the paved half, then if you were on the "wrong" side you got over on the gravel when someone came the other way. Can't remember how they handled the hills, I wasn't old enough to drive. I bet some lawyer would have a circus if they tried that now.

On our place in S.E. Nebraska we had an F-12 Farmall "on steel"; because of this, I was very aware of these lug signs. They were posted on all paved roadways, i.e. Black-top and concrete, which usually meant state hi-way, rather then county road. There was a wide shoulder on most of the paved and the lugs could operate out there, on the grass. If you needed to cross the road, it was expected that you would cover it with something like old car tires to protect the surface.

Totally caught that last night as well! Was watching it waiting to head to midnight mass.

BD - I have to jokingly say that you electrical guys are wierd. I have a friend who is a traffic signal technician, and when he goes on vacation, what do you think he brings back pictures of??

You guessed it - traffic signals.

He's got pictures of signals from Europe, South America, Mexico - and has them catalogued in an album which he will gleefully whip out at the slightest hint of hesitation by any unsuspecting passerby.

And if he happens to drive past a signal control box with someone looking in the open door, he'll slam on the brakes and slide in for a looksee - even if he can't speak a word of the native language, and much to his wife's consternation.

Merry Christmas again to you & yours.

Paul