Because of its obvious remoteness and rugged terrain, Newfoundland did not have much of a road system beyond the capital, St. John's.  The city started registering vehicles in 1906, three years after the first car arrived on the island.  Vehicles were assigned a permanent number by the City Council, and white on black number plates were to be provided by the owner.  The city started providing metal plates (made by a company in St. Louis Missouri!) when annual registration took into effect in 1920.  These had no other identifying features than the date and registration number.  The name "Nfld" did not appear until the province took over the registration system in mid-1925.  There is some suspicion a '25 with 'NFLD' printed on it doesn't exist as the law changed mid-year and there wouldn't have been time to order it from the manufacturer in St. Louis.

Since Nfld did not join Canada until 1949, all issues before that could justifiably be viewed as British Colony rather than Canadian plates.  However most specialists collect them as Canadian plates.  It is a challenging task as the early plates are very rare, and because of harsh weather conditions, are not easy to find in decent condition (as you can see on the left).  No plates have ever been found for 1921 and '23.
 

• The reuse of' 1942 plates to make '44s and the handpainted tin plate of 1945 were part of the War Effort to conserve metal.
• All plates issued since 1982 are valid.

• 1937: Coronation of King George VI.
• 1949: Newfoundland joins Canada.  It was a British Colony before that.  Nothing special happened, plate-wise.
• 1965: Labrador unites with Newfoundland.
• 1967: 100th Annversary of the Formation of Canada, Confederation. (1867)
• 1969: Completion of the Churchill Hydroelectric Dam.

• The City of St. John's plates from 1920 to '25 used a new thousand series of numbers each year.  Less than a 1000 vehicles were registered each year:
• '20: 1000 series
• '21: 2000 series
• '22: 3000 series
• '23: 4000 series
• '24: 5000 series
• '25: 6000 series (expired May '31, 1925).
• Suprisingly, HAA-001 follows AZZ-999 because all the intervening letters are used for non-passenger types.

Special Issues

In 1966 a front booster plate was issued with the normal rear plate.  It read "Come Home Year".  This was to encourage Newfies who had fled their homeland for better opportunities in the big cities, like Toronto, to come back home for a visit.  Given how infrequently cars with Newfoundland plates can be seen in Toronto, I wonder how well this scheme worked?  Naturally those in Newfoundland don't need to be told this!

In 1996, this special plate was issued to commemorate the landing of Cabot, an Italian explorer who landed in Newfoundland 5 years after Columbus discovered America.  He also explored Nova Scotia, where you find the Cabot Trail on Cape Breton Island.

Happy Valley District

There were no plates for Labrador per-se except for the Happy Valley in the Goose Bay Area.  Small plates were issued to the few vehicles that were there from 1954-60. The purpose was to fund road development.  It is unlikely any vehicles would have been registered before 1954. Plates were issued annually from 1954-60.  After that, appeared a multi-year undated plate as shown at left. Sometime in the early to mid 60s, Labrador started to use regular Nfld plates.

Links

• Elsewhere on this site: Stickers on plates 1970-date
• There is one page of contact information on the Motor Registration Division
• John Hayes has some good pictures on Nfld plates, covering many of the non-passenger types.
• PL8S has an interesting page on the early license plates issued in the Happy Valley of Labrador, to fund highway development.