On the streets of early 20th century America, nothing moved faster than 10mph. Responsible parents would tell their children, “Go outside and play in the streets.” Then the automobile happened, and before long thousands of children were being killed by them every year. Much of the public viewed the car as a death machine. Pedestrian deaths were considered public tragedies, and cities built monuments in memory of children who had been stuck and killed by cars. Mothers of children killed in the streets were given a special white star to honor their loss. The main cause of these deaths was that the rules of the street were vastly different than they are today. A street functioned like a city park or pedestrian mall, where you could move in any direction without really thinking about it. The only moving hazards were animals and other people. If a car hit someone, the car was to blame. It wasn’t long before a subtle shift allowed for streets to be reimagined as places where cars belonged and people didn’t. That’s when the term “jaywalking” was coined. “Jay” was a derogatory term for someone from rural America, walking around the city, gawking at all the tall buildings and being oblivious to the traffic. Soon it became a legal term meaning someone who crosses the street at the wrong place or time.
