By Mark Patinkin
There was some demoralizing news the other week about an area of Rhode Island lore. We've long seen ourselves as a vanity-plate capital, but a new study shows we're not.
The American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators just announced that the vainest state is not Rhode Island. It's Virginia. Sixteen percent of motorists there have personal tags.
New Hampshire is the second vainest. Vanity-plate penetration there is 14 percent.
In Illinois and Nevada, it's about 13 percent.
Rhode Island? We rank a lowly 21st, with personal tags on only 3.6 percent of cars.
That's embarrassingly un-vain.
I see it as a call for action.
To do my part, I've spent some time trying to come up with vanity plates that would be just right for folks in Rhode Island. I can't top some of the local legends, like PPMD, the real plate of a Barrington urologist. And I once saw BRIS 1 - a bris being a Jewish circumcision ceremony. The plate was owned by a Providence rabbi who performed that ritual. "I'm a Rhode Islander," he explained to me when I called. "Rhode Islanders like vanity plates."
...
For the full text of this article visit www.projo.com