The History of the “This Car Climbed Mt. Washington” Bumper Sticker

Chances are good that, if you’ve spent any amount of time driving the roads of America, there’s a bumper sticker you’ve seen out there proudly declaring “This car climbed Mt. Washington.” These stickers are so ubiquitous that in 2023, the Boston Globe published an article called “Peak cringe? Critics take aim at ‘This car climbed Mount Washington’ bumper stickers.” What I did not know, and what I imagine many people also don’t know, is that the Mount Washington auto road is the oldest mountain auto road in America, and the history of these bumper stickers goes way, way back.

Building to the top

The history of the auto road began with the need to move wheat crops from Canada to the United States. No ice-free seaport was available in the winter months, so a railroad line was built from Montreal to Portland, Maine, and passed through Gorham, New Hampshire, about 15 miles away from Mount Washington. In 1850, the railroad rebuilt a portion of the carriage road from Gorham into Pinkham Notch. At the same time, they financed the construction of the foot-and-horseback Glen Bridle Path to the summit of Mount Washington. In 1852, the first Summit House was built on Mount Washington. The following year, the New Hampshire State Legislature granted a charter for the Mount Washington Road Company to build a carriage road to the summit. Work on the road began in 1854; however, the Mount Washington Road Company went bankrupt in 1856, having vastly underestimated the work involved. Its successor, the Mount Washington Summit Road Company, was formed in 1859 to continue the work, and the road officially opened on August 8, 1861. With the introduction of motorized vehicles from the end of the 19^th century to the beginning of the 20^th century, motor traffic increased until the Mount Washington Summit Road Company formally made the change from horses to motors in 1912.

Mount Washington Hotel with Mount Washington in the background, circa 1906. Photo: Library of Congress; colorized by Josh Seasholtz.

A memento of the drive

The famous “This car climbed Mt. Washington” bumper stickers actually started as wired-on cardboard strips attached to vehicles. According to Howie Wemyss, former manager of the Mount Washington Auto Road and currently a consultant for them. He provided me with the images below. The first photo is from circa 1940 brochures, with the car heading toward the camera sporting a “This car climbed Mt. Washington, N.H.” cardboard strip. The second photo is a crop of the same photo, focusing on that car. As the license plate shows the year 1938, he surmises that the cardboard strip was given out as early as that year. He hasn’t been able to determine exactly when they started, so he’s simply said they started handing them out in the 1930s.

Photo from a circa 1940 Mount Washington Auto Road brochure. Photo: Mount Washington Auto Road; colorized by Josh Seasholtz.

Howie does know approximately when the placards were replaced with the vinyl versions because he has the letters from his predecessor, Douglas Philbrook, to Sunshine Graphics, the company that began producing the vinyl strips around 1968. Today, these stickers are given out to each vehicle at the time they pay to drive the Auto Road to the summit, and are also available for sale in the gift shops.

Crop of the same photo showing the placard. Photo: Mount Washington Auto Road; colorized by Josh Seasholtz.

Considering the challenges of the drive, it’s no surprise that those who made the ascent in early cars were interested in having a badge of honor to mark the achievement. The road gains over 4,000 feet in elevation, climbing from an altitude of 1,527 feet at the base to 6,145 feet near the summit. The average grade is 11.6%, with extended sections reaching 18%, and the final stretch peaking at 22%. Mount Washington is notorious for its severe weather, at one time holding the record for the fastest recorded wind speed on Earth (231 mph in 1934). Fog, high winds, and rapid temperature changes are common, adding a layer of risk to the drive. Because of these conditions, visitors are warned with a list of vehicle restrictions for traveling on the auto road.

I’m sure you’ve seen these around. Photo: Sujit kumar, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Racing to the top

Almost since motorized vehicles first ascended the auto road, people have been racing to the top of the mountain and attempting to set new speed records. The longest-running and perhaps most famous of these races is the “Climb to the Clouds” Mt. Washington hillclimb. It first began in 1904 and continued sporadically for decades until it went on hiatus in 1961. It was revived from 1990 until 2001, and was then revived again in 2011 and continues to this day. The list of automobile records set on the auto road contains some recognizable names, including F.O. Stanley, who set the first record in 1899 in a Stanley Locomobile at 2 hours and 10 minutes, and the most recent driver to set a record, Travis Pastrana in 2021 in a 2020 Subaru Impreza WRX STI at 5 minutes and 28.67 seconds.

Mt. Washington summit sign. Photo: Bronayur at the English-language Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Parodies and knock-off bumper stickers

Given the popularity of the stickers, parodies and humorous take-offs of the stickers were and are inevitable. Some of these take-offs include: “This car didn’t climb Mt. Washington,” “This Car Climbed Mt. Katahdin” (a mountain with no auto road), “This car climbed Mt. Everest,” “This car climbed my driveway”, and “This car climbed Capitol Hill.” And, of course, enterprising people have used the internet to create and sell their own “This car climbed Mt. Washington” knockoff stickers. But if you’re one of the brave motoring souls who’ve actually done it, slap that sticker on your bumper. You and your vehicle have earned it.