An article on this topic.
What’s losing one’s head have to do with a Rolex? 
It actually happened to an elementary school classmate. His arm wasn’t torn off, but his hand was smashed and his wrist and forearm were frozen in a permanently crooked position. I ran into him once years later. They had managed to straighten out his wrist somewhat, but it didn’t have much function.
No, I don’t remember that. I imagine if there was a peak for that it was when everybody was smoking and few cars had AC.
How often does that happen nowadays? A lot, or all the time?
Thank you for posting the link.
It’s hard to find much information. The news stories from my youth aren’t online.
I vaugely recall some PSA’s, but it’s been too long ago. There were a lot done on various topics.
There’s a difference between “getting a car accident where your arm is cut off” and “getting your arm cut off because a truck passed close enough hit it without doing any damage to your car.”
The one our teacher told us before a field trip was where a girl stuck her head out the bus window, the bus went around a corner, her head hit the stop sign and decapitated her, and her body fell back into the bus.
My parents never rested their arms on the car window ledges and I was never allowed to so much as put my fingers out the window.
Now one of my favourite things about driving is hanging my arm out the window.
That was a standalone joke (the guy is more upset about losing his nice watch than his arm), unrelated to the other anecdote about decapitation.
But…but…how do you not see the car coming dangerously close to you and not pull your arm back in?
Growing up in Connecticut, much of the year it’s too cold to even have the windows open. So when summer comes and it’s nice out, one of my minor pleasures was hanging my hand out the window and enjoying the breeze. (And it’s rural enough that you’re more likely to clip a tree or shrub branch than another car.)
An actual set of “verse by the side of the road” signs:
Don’t stick your elbow
Out too far
Or it may go home
In another car
BURMA SHAVE
If this happened a lot in the past, or even nowdays, you’d think there’d be dozens and dozens of occurances of people’s side mirrors getting clipped of their cars. You just don’t see that kind of thing happening. If it does it’s usually getting clipped while pulling into a garage or parking too close to someone. Never hear of a mirror getting clipped by a passing vehicle.
Actually, that happened to a friend from college, when he was visiting me in southcentral Connecticut. We were going down a 45MPH street, and the car in the opposing lane was a little too far over and clipped my friend’s side view mirror. They didn’t stop, though.
I’ve been driving for fifty years and have never been involved in an accident that would have resulted in an arm amputation. I have never heard of anyone ever losing an arm in this manner.
Is it still a thing? Was it ever a thing is the question I ask. A couple of dimly remembered folktales don’t make a trend. Do you see a lot of one-armed septuagenarians walking about? If not, what has happened to all these folks who lost arms due to car window accidents?
While I can easily believe that sticking your arm straight out of your window to catch wind (or sticking your head out, for that matter) could result in its forceful removal, I have a hard time time believing that merely resting your elbow on your sill without sticking it out would result in it being removed without your car also being damaged. The few times I’ve rested my arm on my windowsill it didn’t extend outside the car even an inch.
There was a horror flick about a pianist whose hand was amputated as he was driving. The hand came back and haunted him. I don’t remember the name. Seems like it may have been on a Creep Show episode.
You’d also think that there would be lots of instances of dogs losing their tongues.
I remember reading about arm amputations in this manner. I even remember reading about one guy who had his arm ripped off, and didn’t notice until 600 miles later.
Of course, I read about these in the National Enquirer.
That’s definitely not a thing.
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