The "1-ADAM-12" Unit Designation was technically incorrect.  There are 18 stations [Divisions] in the City of Los Angeles.  Station 1 is Central Division.  Two-person patrol units are designated "ADAM" Units. - I.D. #12 would be their assigned area. So, "1-ADAM-12" was a two-person patrol unit working out of Central Division. But they didn't did they?  They were shown working out of Rampart Division, which is Division 2.  Technically then, they should have been 2-ADAM-12.  Several reasons for the recognized technical flaw: "1-ADAM-12" had a much better sound to it, Rampart Division had just recently built one of the newer stations at the time in 1965, and traffic in/around Central Division was a problem.   There is no "12" unit designator for the Rampart Division Patrol Section either.  For more information check out the LAPD site and visit the Rampart Division Community Section.

 

The actors referred to the "L" car occasionally and this was a one man patrol vehicle.  Jack Webb referred to the "L" car as a "lonely car."

 

Flaws; on the old can lights ("tin cans") on the patrol cars, the designation "1-012" was also incorrect in earlier versions of the show. The side of the can lights should have shown the station [Division] the car was assigned to and the last three numbers of the shop number (not the assigned area).  Current LAPD patrol units have the shop number on the roof and the Division stenciled on the trunk in white numbers for helicopter identification.

 

The number on the roof "0-1-2" should have been the shop number of the vehicle, not the beat assignment - the air units identified the unit in this manner to communicate with the patrol officers.  The 1971 Plymouth Satellite and AMC Matador had the "0-1-2" stenciled on the roof, the first year model Belvederes did not.

 

A NOTE from Tom Williams (one of the show's Producer's) "In the first few years the numbers were as you stated but we combined the "shop number" and "area division" number because it was causing too much confusion between the two!   Adam-12 is [was] the "radio designation" for the unit.   The number on the roof was "0-1-2" because the "shop-number" of the unit was "85012."

 

The Red/Amber Units were known as "Tin Cans & Mickey Mouse Ears." The units had steady red lenses facing forward and flashing amber lights facing the rear.

 

The radios used in the series were Motorola "Motrac" & Motran series radios and they are indeed still used today (30+ years). The "Motrac" series radios were half tube and half transistors with the receiver being the latter. The Mocom 70 was all transistorized and not used by LAPD to my knowledge.  (Courtesy of the L.A. City radio shop).

 

In 1973/1974, the LAPD Series "6" -  "POLICEMAN" badges were changed to "POLICE OFFICER" with the addition of women to the Field Patrol Division.

 

ALL license plate letter sequences used on the show (standard & commercial plates) were non-issuable as per CA DMV regulations. On both the gold-on-black & gold-on-blue tags the letters "I" (IDA) & "O" (OCEAN) were NEVER issued next to a number to avoid confusion with the #'s 1 & 0. Thus, the tag# LXI 483 (lincoln-xray-ida) was never issued in real life. You will notice that ALL tag #'s used on Adam-12 either ended in I or O (black plates) or started with I or O (blue plates). Also, as a sidebar, CA plates are issued in order, so blue tags would have started w/ 000 AAA & so on...Commercial tags, which contained 1 letter & 5 #'s, also had only an "I" or "O" on the show.   As far as the street addresses are concerned, any cross-streets (corner of "x & y") actually parallel with numbers being either too high, too low, or simply didn't exist.

(submitted by Adam-12 fan Mark VanCleve)

Adam-12 and Dragnet are the only series honored to use genuine LAPD badges in the filming of the show. Jack Webb was buried with full LAPD Honors, and his badge was retired. It is the only badge in the history of LAPD given to a civilian.