When she first opened the Sequim Licensing Depot, Suzan Mansfield had three license plates, including her own, hanging on the wall. Two and a half years later, nearly all available wall space is splashed with color, random letters and numbers from the ever-growing collection of license plates.
Having all the license plates from the United States and even a few from other counties, Mansfield’s new goal is to begin collecting all the motorcycle plates.
Originally from Forks, Mansfield lived in Sequim before moving to Arizona, only to return to open the area’s vehicle and vessel licensing sub-agency appointed by the State Department of Licensing and the county Auditor’s Office.
As a car and motorcycle enthusiast, Mansfield enjoys the continued exposure to different vehicles and the opportunity to meet nice, interesting people, she said. However, the challenges include keeping pace with legislative actions, regulation changes and enforcing such changes.
As a recent example, state regulations pertaining to disabled parking placards have been tightened because of misuse, Mansfield said. Another law change in January resulted the county Auditor’s Office to charge the same service fee as the sub-agency.
Although no drivers licensing functions are processed at the Sequim Licensing Depot, it’s still a common misunderstanding and thus as a courtesy Mansfield keeps drivers guides on hand.
“As we got going and started helping people they’d ask, ‘Do you want our plate to put up on your wall?’ And we’d say, ‘Oh sure,’ because that’s what we do, you know? Well, then we got on this drive to get all states.
We even started getting a few special plates, like that Italian Armed Forces plate and the Panama Canal plate. From then on, people would see the plates and would want to put theirs up on the wall, too, so we just started taking in all these plates.
Whenever anybody asks me about that Illinois plate that says, ‘Sequim 1’ I have to tell them the story behind it because that, ‘BGY198 plate’ belonged to a lady that grew up in Sequim and that was on her first car.
After growing up she moved to Illinois and had that personalized plate there, but after she retired she came back to Sequim, so now I not only have her first plate, but her last out-of-state plate.
But, the one that’s most touching to me is that World’s Fair plate, the 1939 California plate, because a woman and her husband moved here and I met them when they came in and her husband saw all my plates. He later passed away, but she brought that plate into me.
She told me he’d gotten that plate in California and that was the year he was born. She thought he would want me to have this plate for my wall.
I remember most of the people that have given me plates.
People sometimes come in and offer to buy some of the plates, but I tell them they’re really not mine to sell, but the office’s plates because some of those plates are quite collectable. Also, if you have an older vehicle, a collector vehicle, then you can put a collector vehicle plate on it.
Say, if you had a car from 1963 and you wanted to license it as a collector vehicle, then you’d need to have a 1963 original plate on it, so people are sometimes looking for certain ones.
Aesthetically, I really prefer the old patina, worn plates, and tend to cherish the old ones. I don’t know why really. They are simple and there’s nothing fancy about them and I like that.
If you look at some of the old plates, like that New Hampshire one that says ‘Live free or die’ — some of the things they could put on plates back then would probably not be acceptable in this day and age because they would likely have some sort of meaning that wouldn’t be appropriate.
So, it’s neat to see the evolution of the plates, even what they say on them.
I probably have some plates that you probably wouldn’t see again I bet.”
Sequim Licensing Depot LLC
Hours: 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday and 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday
Location: 625 W. Washington St. Suite 2
Phone: 683-8375
Everyone has a story and now they have a place to tell it. Verbatim is a first-person column that introduces you to your neighbors as they relate in their own words some of the difficult, humorous, moving or just plain fun moments in their lives. It’s all part of the Gazette’s commitment as your community newspaper. If you have a story for Verbatim, contact editor Michael Dashiell at editor@sequimgazette.com.
