It is a clear requirement by law in the present day that all motor vehicles must be registered with the Land Transport Authority (LTA) before they can be driven on public roads.

The LTA gives the following reason why there is a need for registration:

"Registration recognises you as the owner of your vehicle.

As a registered owner of the vehicle, you are responsible for the payment of vehicle-related fees, taxes & licensing, and ensure roadworthiness of your vehicle."

For those who are not familiar with car ownership in Singapore, a lawfully registered vehicle is assigned a licence plate number that can be traced to the vehicle's registered owner by the authorities.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="702"] Source: Wikipedia[/caption]

This is especially useful in criminal and accident cases, where the vehicles involved can be traced.

Before there was vehicle registration

According to a Straits Times (ST) article, up till 1906, there were so few cars in Singapore that registration did not even cross the minds of the colonial authorities.

The car was in its infancy back then, having just been invented in the late 19th century. It was a luxury item for the rich, much more so in those days than they are today.

Thus, the appearance of any car on the public road in Singapore up till 1906 was easy to remember by its appearance and noise.

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First car to be registered

But the number of cars gradually grew and in 1906, the first car was registered in Singapore. It was given the car plate number S.1., and subsequent registrations continued with the numbering sequence as S.2., S.3., and so on.

The car with S.1. plate belonged to a woman called Mrs GM Dare. If you are a motorhead, you will probably be interested to know that it was a small 10 horsepower, single-cylinder, two-seater of a car.

ST called the car a "runabout", which suggests it was an American-made Cadillac Runabout that looks something like one of these models:

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="699"] Cadillac Runabout from 1906. Source: Wikipedia.[/caption]

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="696"] Cadillac Runabout from 1902. Source: Wikipedia[/caption]

Ironically, Dare called her car "Ichiban" which means "Number One" in Japanese. She might have thought otherwise had she known that the Japanese Occupation would arrive in Singapore in 36 years.

Apparently, the local Malays thought the car to be a "fearsome monster", according to ST. They called it "The Devil Wind Carriage".

We couldn't find any photos of S.1. itself, but here is an old photo from ST of a row of cars in 1909. The closest registered successor among them to S.1. is S.37., which is the first car from the left.

Here is a short snippet on the first registered car in Singapore from the same ST article:

We take the registration of vehicles as a given these days, since it's required by law.

And with the vast number of vehicles plying our roads (956,430 as of 2016), it is hard to imagine a time when vehicle registration was not a requirement.

But history tells us that actually, the registration of the vehicles in Singapore has been around for a pretty long time.

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Top image adapted from Wikipedia.

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