Early car manufacturers in no way almost entirely escaped liability. There were many people killed or injured by the starter crank alone and the law suits to go along with it. It's the single biggest reason that steam cars were around until the advent of the electric starter.

The Ford Model T, "generally regarded as the first affordable automobile" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Model_T), over 15 million manufactured, had a hand crank. A '40s era tractor that my family "inherited" when we bought our 25 acres of land had a hand crank.

That said, while hard to use, that tractor's hand crank automatically disconnected well enough once the engine got started. Then again my father, born in the early '30s, grew up using them.

> That said, while hard to use, that tractor's hand crank automatically disconnected well enough once the engine got started. Then again my father, born in the early '30s, grew up using them.

Hell, I was born 30 years later, and they still existed on tractors, fork lifts, and other, assorted engines.

There are a couple 'safety rules' when using a hand crank on a gasoline engine:

1) Always grip the crank with the thumb wrapped below with the fingers. So, all your fingers on ONE side of the crank, instead of four fingers on one side, and the thumb on the other

2) NEVER push the crank down the right side of the rotation.

3) If the hand crank binds when inserted through the starting crank bushing and into the crank ratchet, don't crank start the car. Too much bind will prevent the crank from releasing from the ratchet.

Ah, yes, 1) is a rule for self-loading rifles with reciprocating charging handles, starting in the US I suppose with the '30s M1 Garand. On the off chance the gun will fire while you're manipulating the handle, make sure your thumb is out of the way so at worst your palm will be beat up a bit.

The AR-15/M16/M4 which follows that family (M1 and '50s M14) lacks that "feature", replacing the lost functionality with a separate forward bolt assist. In other major rifles of that general era, the AK-47 etc. and SIG SG 55x and I think it's 510 predecessor reciprocates, this in fact goes back to the original Nazi StG 44 "storm rifle", the FAL and G3 don't.

Then again 3 point seat belts weren't made generally available until the 90ies.

I believe you're off by a few decades. 1960s.

Auto-retraction was a thing by the mid 1970s.