Join the Car Talk Community!  Dashboard Definition  The Puzzler
RAY: You were pretty close but, anyway, before there were cars,
people used to get around using horses and buggies, and as you
might imagine the roads were dirt and when it rained the roads
became muddy. You with me so far?  TOM: Yeah.  RAY: So if you
were in a buggy and the horse was trotting along, the rear
hooves would kick up mud. So carriages or wagons had a board
that was fixed at an angle not unlike the dashboards of cars,
and it was called the "dashboard." In fact, if you remember,
Ward Bond leading the wagon trains across the plains.  TOM:
Yeah, they put their feet on.  RAY: They used to put their feet
on there. And when they started building cars, of course, they
were really adapting carriages.  TOM: Sure.  RAY: So the thing
that they attached the instruments in the car to, or the
horseless wagon, was called the "dashboard" because it looked
just like the dashboard of a wagon. And it was called the
"dashboard" because it did its job pr