Tires: Snow tires, backyard mechanics, snow tires

Question
Hello Barry,

   I am also an expert on this site so I thought I would ask you this question.  I am writing a newspaper article and I need to know when snow tires were invented.  I know that there was a day when people took off regular tires in the late fall and put on "snow tires" for the winter.  This was before radial tires were invented.  If you have any idea when this happened I would appreicate it.  I have looked everywhere I can think of but I have come up with a zero.

Answer
Jack,

I looked, too!  And like you I came up blank, but I suspect snow tires were "invented" by backyard mechanics who cut notches in tires and found they got better traction in mud and snow (probably mud first) and the technique was applied to production tires - so the source or inventor is probably lost in the winds of time.