30,000 and counting
Junction City man collects license plates, oldest one is 100 years old
8:08 p.m. Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Junction City — Metal clatters as Jack Welsh stacks and sifts through his collection of license plates.
Welsh has collected more than 30,000 plates in 50 years at his auto part store in Junction City. The plates represent Kansas counties, the 50 states and even Canadian provinces.
Side-by-side, the plates span 6 miles long.
“We try to come up with different types of collections, but the problem with them is that it’s hard to have space to display a collection,” Welsh says.
In fact, Welsh helped gather this collection of license plates for the Geary County Motor Vehicle Office. The collection dates back to 1913, when the first plate was issued for the county.
Welsh volunteers for the local historical society, where he gives presentations on license plate history.
“For instance, this display here on the top here, is one from every year in Kansas,” he says, pointing to the ceiling of the office at his auto part store.
His oldest plate is 100 years old and came out before the state issued metal ones. This Junction City plate is made of leather.
In the 90’s, Welsh used to trade kids fireworks for license plates at his auto parts store in Junction City. Each license plate bought 10 cents in fireworks.
Welsh, his wife and kids even have their own license plates.
He took us to the three buildings where he stores the tags. He has a special room to sort them and a car with tags spilling out.
So which one of the 30,000 is his favorite?
“Most tag collectors would say they liked it before they came up with this sticker method,” he says. “To put the stickers and the counties and the year on them. They had a different tag each year.”
Welsh says he has no intention to stop collecting. He enjoys every moment he’s spends on it.
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