​​The author, John Marek, is a writer and executive director of the Anson Economic Development Partnership. 

The other night, I wanted to know how close my wife was to home, so I texted her, “What’s ur 20?” And like any good child of the ’70s, she texted me back her location.  

One of the weirder elements of the already bizarre pop culture of the 1970s was the widespread fascination with long-haul trucking. Driven by the popularity of movies like “Smokey and the Bandit” and “Every Which Way But Loose,” and hit songs like “Convoy,” the public perception of the era’s truck drivers was that of modern-day cowboys, riding a “range” of highways and sparring with law enforcement that wanted to shut them down. This highly romanticized notion of trucking became a cultural touchstone, impacting everything from CB radio sales to fashion.  

My high school buddy, Jeff, had a notebook with the 10-codes printed on the cover. Knowing his sense of humor, I am sure this was intended as irony, but still, the fact that such a product was even available says a lot about the times. CB radios became so ridiculously popular that the FCC had to increase the number of channels from 19 to 40 to meet demand. There was even a magazine, CB Action, which featured scantily-clad models on the cover talking on their CBs, and a short-lived series of collector cards with cartoon depictions of CB slang.  

I never had a real CB radio but I did have a portable radio that could receive the transmissions, and since my family’s house was less than a mile from U.S. Route 2, a major east-west highway, there was usually a lot of chatter on the airwaves. Nothing of any real value or interest, but I got to hear all those 10-codes, as well as the latest on gas prices and speed traps.  

The central plot of “Smokey and the Bandit” was the illicit shipment of 400 cases of Coors beer from Texarkana to Atlanta. At the time, Coors was only distributed west of the Mississippi River, a fact that was largely lost on the population east of the Mississippi until the film pointed it out.  

That same high school buddy Jeff visited his grandparents in Iowa in the summer of 1978 and triumphantly returned with a case of Coors, a can or two of which found its way into my fridge. I’m sure he felt like quite the rumrunner. I can picture him riding shotgun in the family Travelall, ears tuned to the CB, listening for reports of “bears” on the road ahead.  

After 40 years largely off the radar, long-haul trucking is having another moment in the spotlight, this time as the result of COVID and supply chain issues. It is a necessary reminder that our economy relies on those 18-wheelers and the men and women who drive them. While I am sure CBs still play a role in truckers’ lives, I would guess that mobile phones are the preferred mode of communication, like the rest of society. And that brings me back around to my text/10-code mashup, “What’s ur 20?”