​You've got the GREEN light
to celebrate
National Traffic Light Day
on Saturday, May 20, 2017!

No poet wrote more poems about traffic lights than Emmett Lee Dickinson (Emily Dickinson's third cousin, twice removed -- at her request).  Celebrate this year by sharing Dickinson's now classic poem, "Now cars within my city go" (below on the left), a poem written shortly after the introduction of cars and traffic lights in his hometown, Washerst, PA.  Perhaps Dickinson's poem will inspire to celebrate responsibly -- as it inspired his third cousin Emily to pen her poem "New feet within my garden go" (below on the right). 
​

By Emmett Lee Dickinson:
 
Now cars within my city go,
Now drivers stir the road;
A traffic light is now on Elm
Controls the multitude.
 
Now cartage moves upon the green,
Now warnings yellow show;
And still the pensive drivers turn,
And still the rush hour’s slow!

By Emily Dickinson:
 
New feet within my garden go,
New fingers stir the sod;
A troubadour upon the elm
Betrays the solitude.

New children play upon the green,
New weary sleep below;
And still the pensive spring returns,
And still the punctual snow!

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Below is information from some of our past National Traffic Light Day celebrations!

National Traffic Light Day

If you are unable to visit the National Traffic Light and Traffic Sign Museum in Washerst, PA, on May 16, then celebrate National Traffic Light Day with us -- on the website for the Emmett Lee Dickinson Museum (above the coin-op Laundromat on Dickinson Boulevard in Washerst). 

National Traffic Light Day is always celebrated on the Saturday before the Memorial Day Weekend to remind drivers to be safe on Memorial Day -- and on every day of the year!

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A NTLTSM Exhibit in Honor of Luminaries in the Field of Traffic Safety

A new exhibit at the National Traffic Light and Traffic Sign Museum opens on National Traffic Light Day, May 17, 2014, to honor leaders in the field of traffic safety.  Those being honored include the following:

Right:  Adok Rynkidynki, Pennsylvania's first snow warden, appointed by the governor to keep snow flattened and evenly distributed on roads to facilitate traffic.

Below left:  Constance Stallings, the inventor of traffic control motions prior to the invention of traffic lights.

Below center:  Zephyr N. Zookitashe, inventor of blinking traffic lights and animal crossing signs (after he accidentally ran over his wife's cat Sylvester; he later said that he thought he had seen his wife's pussy cat clear the driveway).

Below right:  Gussie Warbler Metford, who invented hand signals for automobile drivers. She demonstrated the need for signals by rolling down Main Streets across America in a giant wheel.

Above:  Adok Rynkidynki

Above:  Constance Stallings

Above:  Zephyr N. Zookitashe

Above:  Gussie Warbler Metford

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Below is information from the Past NTL Day celebrations:

For more information on the Nat'l Traffic Light & Traffic Sign Museum (shown above), click HERE.

Ewald Broadnax, Inventor of the Traffic Light

Did you know that the traffic light was invented by Ewald Broadnax of Washerst, PA? 
(Pictured at the right)

Of course, the very first traffic light was not electric.  It was a complex gas lamp that  was operated manually.  The first light was mounted at the intersection of Dickinson Boulevard and Main Street, and it lasted a month before it exploded causing the Great Washerst Fire of 1867.

Pictured at the right:  When visiting Washerst, be sure to visit the monument to Ewald Broadnax on Dickinson Boulevard!

Knut Eckdahl, Traffic Light Commissioner

After the first automobile accident occured in Washerst, PA, the Washerst City Council appointed Knut Eckdahl (pictured at the left) as the first Traffic Light Commissioner in the United States.  To this day, cities and towns follow Eckdahl's plan of unsynchronized lights to keep the traffic slow-going.

A popular tourist attraction in Washerst is Knut Eckdahl's home (pictured at the left).

The Demko Brothers, Inventors of the Turn Signal

Traffic in Washerst and around the country was jumbled and chaotic, especially at intersections -- with or without traffic lights -- until the Demko Brothers of Washerst (pictured at the right) invented the turn signals for the automobile.

Kazio Demko (on the left) invented the right turn signal.  Zigmunt Demko (on the right) invented the left turn signal.

Esteban Ruiz-Banderas, Inventor of the Electric Traffic Light

Esteban Ruiz-Banderas (pictured at the left) was a limousine driver for Rick O'Shea and Norma Leigh Krass, known as the Dancing Dickinsons  (for more information on the Dancing Dickinsons, click HERE).  Tired of the exploding gas traffic lamps invented by Ewald Broadnax, Ruiz-Banderas invented the first electric traffic light. 

The electric lights certainly proved safer than the exploding gas lamps --  except when the colored light bulbs burned out!  Confused drivers were more likely to be involved in accidents when traffic lights had burned out bulbs.

Dagmara Snopek, Light Changer

Dagmara Snopek (pictured at the right) was the first light changer hired by the Washerst Department of Transportation and Traffic Lights to change the burned out bulbs in the electric traffic lights.

A monument to Snopek and other light changers (pictured at the far right) stands in Dickinson Park in Washerst.

Wally Krammitt, Director of the PA Department of Transportation

Washerst, PA, is "first" in many ways when it comes to traffic safety in the United States.  Besides being home to the inventor of the traffic light, Washerst was also the birthplace of Wally Krrammitt (pictured at the left), the first Director of the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, the first DOT in the country!

Theodosia "Zella" Bristowe,
Inventor of the Traffic Cone

Theodosia"Zella" Bristowe (pictured at the right) was from one of Washerst's most prominant families, one of the first to own and drive an automobile through town!  Later in life, Zella was the founder of the National Traffic Light and Traffic Sign Museum in Washerst, and she was the inventor of the traffic safety cone.

For more information on the National Traffic Light and Traffic Sign Museum, click HERE.

Chevette Linkinhoker, Inventor of Lane Lines

In the United States,the first documented use of a painted center line was in 1911 along Washerst's Dickinson Boulevard.  According to the state of Pennsylvania's Department of Transportation, the idea of using a painted center line was conceived  by Washerstian Chevette Linkinhoker (pictured at the right) after watching a leaky milk wagon leave a white trail along the road.

Honok Olbrecht Vroomski,
First Proponent of Car Pooling

Honok Olbrecht Vroomski (pictured at the left in the dark suit), the Deputy Director of the Washerst Department of Transportation and Traffic Lights, was the first person to promote and encourage car pooling.

Today many cities honor the work of Vroomski with "HOV" lanes.

Washerst DMV

One of the many "firsts" of Washerst related to transportation and traffic is the Washerst Division of Motor Vehicles, the first DMV in the United States.

FOR THE COMPLETE CALENDAR OF EVENTS IN WASHERST, CLICK HERE.

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All things Emmett Lee Dickinson (poetry, museum stuff, Washerst facts and figures, etc.) © 2013 & 2014 by Jim Asher