Gas Lines: The Crisis of 1973

The world lined up to buy gas in 1973…and it was ugly!

So bye, bye, Miss American Pie

Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry

And them good ole boys were drinking whiskey 'n rye

Singin' this'll be the day that I die

This'll be the day that I die

Don McLean wrote and released the song in 1971.  Much of it was biographical, as a reflection of what was happening in America during the 1960s with the assassinations of the Kennedys, Martin Luther King, Jr, and the Vietnam War. 

For McLean, it started with what he called the end of the happy 50s, the tragic plane crash of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and JD “the Big Bopper” Richardson in February of 1959. The day the music died.

And then the gas supply dried up…

There were two separate oil crises in the 1970s:

• 1973 with a war in the middle east  

• 1979 with the Iranian revolution

North Americans from coast to coast faced persistent gas shortages as the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, OPEC, disrupted oil supplies.

Here’s what it looked like in the first one in 1973:

• Drivers would go to stations before dawn or late at night, hoping to avoid the lines.

• Odd-even rationing was introduced — meaning that if the last digit on your license plate was odd, you could get gas only on odd-numbered days. 

• Some gas stations took to posting flags — green if they had gas, yellow if rationing was in effect and red if they were out of gas.

• To conserve gas, the maximum speed limit was cut to 55 miles per hour. 

• To cut energy consumption in the broader economy, daylight saving time was introduced year-round at the beginning of 1974, facing criticism from parents whose kids had to go to school before sunrise in the winter months.

And we were driving big vehicles with big engines and poor fuel economy that were not particularly well made.

We felt the pain in our wallets at the gas pumps.

Not surprisingly Auto sales were hurt by the embargo as the price of gasoline soared. The industry never recovered!

A quick sidebar:  In the early 1970s GM, Ford and Chrysler had nearly 83% of the new car industry.  Yes, you heard that right…The ‘Imports’ sold only 17% of the all the cars sold!  

Fast forward 10 years and the total share was down to 71% as the Japanese automakers saw their smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles soar in popularity.

I stopped driving North American cars when I sold my 1976 Chevrolet Caprice Classic and replaced it with a Mazda.  That Chevrolet had a massively fuel inefficient 350 cubic inch V8 engine, bench seats in the front and an AM/FM radio!  I’ve never gone back!

Musicians responded to the crisis.  This novelty classic from Brent Burns was directly aimed at OPEC, ‘Cheaper food or no more food’:

If they don't lower the gas. We're gonna lower the boom, Quit shipping all that wheat and corn, forget the Golden Rule. 

If they don't lower the price of crude we're gonna cut off the food And in about a week they'll sing a different tune.

Yikes!

And 6 years later before we had the opportunity to fully recover, we did it all over again…

Until next time…