Some did, some did not.
Grew up in the 70s and 80s. Me and my brother loved to ride around the back of the station wagon. It was a private play area during car rides. Mom and/or dad could see us at all times, but they still couldn’t really see what we were doing.
My Mother did that when I stood on the passenger seat. She did it when she was 80 and I was driving her somewhere.
My mother was an early believe in lap belts, and paid extra to get them installed in all the family cars, including in the back-facing seat in the station wagon. But we slept in the back of the station wagon (with that seat folded down) on long trips.
I remember the booster seats. I remember hitting a deer in one. But from 6 years old and up I was in the front seat of the car with no booster.
This is not allowed now. In my state you have to be in a booster seat in the back until you are either 4’9" tall or eight years old.
I actually added lap belts to my first car, a Triumph TR3. I bought it in 1964. Our Volkswagens might have had seat belts then but I can’t remember. The Triumph had doors that were only about 12" high at the back edge. You could reach down and grab things off the road while driving.
Link to photo: Triumph TR3 - Wikipedia
If by “car seat” you mean “cramming myself into the well/boot of a VW Bug,” yeah, I remember that. When I started being in cars, there wasn’t even a seatbelt requirement, and I’m not sure if the back seat even had belts. [/old lady stories]
No car seats and no seat belts. I just ran around in the back seat, and luckily we were never in an accident. The longest trip like that was when my parents took a road trip in 1959 from Anchorage to Montana, then across to Portland and back to Anchorage.
Born in 1961. We never used seatbelts. My sisters and I would free-range in the back seat and fight over who got to stand on the hump (perfect for launching a kid through the front windshield). If you were an infant or toddler, you’d sit on my mom’s lap. We had a VW Beetle for a while. One sister would get to sit in the boot behind the back seat. After the Beetle we had a station wagon. Sometimes we’d get to sit/lay in the way back. The station wagon was the first car we had that would ding if you didn’t buckle up. So my dad buckled the seatbelts and tucked them in the seat! The shoulder straps were folded up on the headliner. There was some complicated way to attach them to the seatbelts. I don’t think it was ever attempted. One story regarding the station wagon I’ll never forget was when my sister was in the way back and had her head hanging out the rear window like a dog. That window was the only one in the car that was controlled by a button up front. My dad was oblivious as to what she was doing and pushed the button to close the window. She was creaming but we couldn’t hear her because we were flying down a highway. Luckily my dad noticed her in the rearview mirror and reversed the window. She wasn’t hurt too badly but by the time he reversed it the window was under her chin and her nose was up against the top of the window frame. She had a black and blue nose for a while.
An article I read several years ago flat out said that until shortly before they were required - which was after I was born in 77 but the law in most if not all states by the time my brother arrive in 83 - not only were they uncommon, they were considered both unnecessary and odd.
When I was a baby my parents had a basket for me on the back seat when I was an infant. And I guess I just sat on the seat as a toddler.
Late 60’s… Being an only child I had the whole back of the station wagon to myself on long trips. Completely untethered.
VW Beetles started offering seat belts as an option in the early 1960s. By the late 1960s they were standard from the factory on all cars.
Grew up in the 80s. Don’t remember being in a car seat, but we did always use seatbelts. The earliest car I remember was an orange GM station wagon that we’d sit three wide in the back seat.
I was born in ‘78, and there’s a picture of my mom arriving home with me from the hospital following my birth. She had ridden in the front passenger seat of my dad’s car, holding me in her arms the whole way home.
Nowadays, they wouldn’t let you leave the hospital with your newborn without a properly installed car seat in the backseat of the vehicle.
I remember sitting on the bench seat’s flip-down center armrest as a very young kid.