tracing a California blue plate

[djfordmanjack]

Anybody in the Golden State, is there a legal way to trace the owner/registration of 1970s/80s california Blue plates ?
is there a regional code associated to the plate numbers?
I have a vintage car that was last registered in Cali in about '84 that I would like to know more about.

[hiball3985]

I have never tried it myself but talking to some of my old car friends who have they have told me it can't be done and that info is only released to law enforcement people etc. I don't even know how they kept the records from back then, everything was done with paper and pencil..
I believe plates are just issued randomly and not associated with any region.

[Jeff Norwell]

If you had a Law enforcement friend in that state.. they could search it for you.. although not a legal way to do it.. do to privacy laws today.
Locally i have enforcement friends that can do this but they are hesitant......

[hiball3985]

More worthless info 
California plates are made by prison inmates. New plates are back to black with yellow lettering.

[gasman826]

Absolutely no help to you but Michigan counties were assigned a range of the letter prefixes.  In the '40s and early '50s, LA and LB were assigned to the county I live in.  By mid '50s and into the early '60s, the letters changed to YA through YE (for passenger plates).  This is very general.  One could buy plates at any Secretary of State office so the letters would be of the county of purchase.  With Michigan's Authentic Plate, it took a lot of searching to find right letters for my '57s and a lot more to find one for the '41!

[djfordmanjack]

Thnx guys, I am not looking for any illegal investigation. Every info about different registration rules in different states is interesting to me. In my home country back in the 1950s there were booklets that showed ALL plates with numbers, vehicle type and owner w/adress
Of course these are rare collectables today, but they still show up sometimes.
In case that any of the Californian members is interested in 1934 Fords I could post the old blue plate, who knows...

[hiball3985]

You are baffling me G. I don't recall any blue plate until 1970. I have a friend who collects plates and all his early California plates are black/yellow or yellow/black..

[djfordmanjack]

Jim, sorry for the misunderstanding, of course its a post 1970 blue plate registration on a 1934 Ford. not a 1934 blue plate. I need to take a look at the actual plate for reg stickers to see when it was actually issued.

[hiball3985]

Thanks G I understand now, sorry, I'm old and get cornfused easily