BELLEVUE • Scanning through John Davies’ license plate collection is like looking through a picture postcard of Idaho’s automotive history.

It features early porcelain plates baked onto iron that were so fragile that few have survived. It showcases stickers issued in place of license plates during World War II when the country was saving tin for the war effort.

A 1928 plate displays the first outline of a potato, and a 1948 plate features a spud loaded with butter and sour cream that looks good enough to eat. The collection also includes the specialty plates issued for colleges, the armed forces and favorite causes such as the Basques and flying, which happens to be the newest. The late Sheriff Orville Drexler of Hailey had the No. 1 among the early plates, and Rupert House, a supervisor at the Triumph Mine, had No. 3; now Davies has both.

Davies is exhibiting 174 of his plates this summer at the Bellevue Museum, where admission is free. He has another hundred at home.

“I have every one of Idaho’s plates. It cost me an arm and leg to update it, what with five branches of the military and reserves, three or four National Guard plates and all the other plates,” he said.