“Don’t Mark Time—Make Time, Use the Lincoln Tunnel.” This was the prize-winning slogan selected last week by the Port of New York Authority to advertise its newest tunnel. Meanwhile Travelers Insurance Co. was doing a little advertising of its own. Its 38-page booklet, addressed to those who wish to “make time,” was grimly titled “Death Begins at 40.” The title referred to the fact that automobile accidents which happen at speeds over 40 m.p.h. are more than twice as likely to be fatal as accidents that happen below that speed. Behind the booklet is last year’s record road toll—40,300 dead. Dramatic centrepiece of “Death Begins at 40” is Grant Wood’s painting, Death on the Ridge Road, which shows a big red truck about to crash head-on into a black sedan at a hilltop curve. Pages of statistics prove that most fatal accidents occur to experienced male drivers in the prime of life going straight ahead on dry roads in clear weather—but at high speed. Most arresting fact: In all its history the U. S. has had but 15 years* of war, with a total killed of 244,357. Killed on U. S. highways during the last 15 years of peace: 441,912.
*More accurately, 16 years, 7 months.
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