cess, for the program was very well received by the citizens, eager to do
something themselves about the ever growing menace on our highways,
caused by thoughtless motorists. The program seemed to appeal to them
as a down-to-earth way of attacking the problem at the grass roots level,
for here was a program, developed many years ago by the National
Safety Council, to teach fleet drivers, the drivers of our large trailer
trucks, our intercity buses, the knack of learning how to "drive to arrive
alive. " The original program, as it was developed, was cut here, trimmed
there, changed to the compact course as we know it today, the driver
improvement program, or better yet, the defensive driving program.
Nor was it presented a bit too soon, either, for we have reached a point
where daily we realize the loss of 134 lives, see 5. 000 disabling injuries,
and stand a dollar loss of over $23, 300, 000.
Locally, here in Maryland, our deaths have risen from 461 in 1961 to
nearly 700 in 1965. Those injured climbed from 26, 000 in 1961 to nearly
48, 000 in 1965. This is a loss to this State that we can no longer afford.
When the Superintendent of State Police, Colonel Carey Jarman, first
saw an outline of the course, he immediately ordered 32 members of the
Maryland State Police to be trained as instructors as soon as possible, so
that they could launch a comprehensive attack out in the counties,
beyond the realm of the Baltimore Safety Council. This they have done,
and eminently well, for to date these men alone have taught 98 separate
groups, reaching a total of 2, 505 persons. The graduates come from all
walks of life, sit side by side and drink in the information given to them
by experts on the subject. These men still continue to teach on their
duty time, as well as on their off-duty time, because they feel that only
through education of the motoring public will we ever be able to turn the
tide in auto accidents, and the death and misery that goes hand in hand
with them. In this belief, I most wholeheartedly concur.
Several years ago, feeling concern not only with the genera] deteri-
orating picture of traffic safety in Maryland but with a realization that
accidents involving operators of State-owned cars and those operators
using their own cars on official State business were experiencing an
alarming upswing in frequency, I appointed a State Safety Committee
to act in my behalf in an effort to curtail these accidents. At the sug-
gestion of the Committee, headed by Mr. Hugh Taylor, Deputy State
Treasurer, Major Wilbour Conroy, Adjutant of the Maryland State
Police, was named as Chairman. They have made real progress in their
attempts to cut down on State vehicle accidents. But they realize that
there is more, much more, to be done. Soon, the driver improvement
program came to their attention, and they seized on it as the biggest
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