I hitchhiked up and down the west coast and Mexico in the 1990s, after hitch-hiking had already been vilified in the media. For a large, white male like myself, it was relatively safe, because most of the danger in hitch-hiking encounters actually flows from the hiker to the driver. So if you are the hiker, and you know you're safe, then a lot of the risk has been removed. (For female hitch-hikers, it's another story.)

There were several periods when hitchhiking was widely accepted, and they usually coincided with large groups of otherwise respectable people having to hit the road. The Depression was one of those times. Post-war periods, when soldiers are returning home, have been others.

These days car ownership is so common that you have to be young and crazy, desperately poor, or criminal to hitch hike, and drivers know that.

It's still surprising how many drivers will pick you up. There's a lot of lonely people looking for conversation on the road.