As a young child growing up in PA, I recall many times my father, who was a deputy game warden, would be called out to assist in processing deer kills along the many country roads in our area of PA.
Normally he wouldn't assist on the human side of these incidents because that was primarily the job of either the local law enforcement officials and/or the state police.
He'd often tell stories of how a deer would often completely total a car that had the misfortune of encountering a deer standing in the middle of the darkened country road.
Deer are basically nocturnal animals that rummage along the roadsides at night looking for food that humans toss alongside these remote roads [probably right under those "Do Not Litter Our Roads!" signs!]. The damage to the vehicles was usually so extensive that it'd be beyond repair.
Unfortunately, often the driver and the car's other occupants were often very seriously injured as well. Some of them were killed either by being ejected through the windshields--hardly any cars had seat belts back in the early 1950's--or were killed if a deer had stuck himself in the windshield and was thrashing his four legs trying to get out from being stuck inside the car.
What made matters worse was that back then, even if a person managed to escape with only minor injuries from the deer strike, he couldn't have the deer to eat for food! Nope, back then the state confiscated the deer to process its meat and then send it on to various state prisons for the inmates to eat.
Didn't sound fair to me: A guy gets his car totaled and he's probably injured enough to be laid up for awhile [maybe even laid out!], and what does he get for all his troubles? Nothing, not even a "Thank You" card from the prison inmates who got that fresh venison!
I still remember when I was only about 8 or 9 YO (c. 1954-55) when my father was called out one Thanksgiving weekend to process a deer kill. Both the father buck and the mother doe were killed, but the one baby fawn was still alive. Since it was a long holiday weekend, the full-time game warden in charge knew that the nearest wild game preserve would be closed for several days. He couldn't figure out what to do with this now-orphaned little fawn.
My father told him he could carry the little fawn in his pickup truck to our property, make a temporary cage out of several runs of chicken wire, and he'd hold the baby fawn for a few days. I still have that 60 YO photo my mother took of yours truly feeding that fawn with a baby bottle full of milk!
That was in PA back in the 1950's. These days right here in middle TN we sometimes have deer encounters like that today. Although I live in a fairly developed residential area, often times during mating and/or migrating season I'd see deer crossing the road on which I live at 1:00 am.
The closer you get to the Percy Priest State Park--a small wooded resort area alongside the shores of of dammed up Percy Priest River just east of us--the lake was created by damming up the river just south along I-40 E--you can see the dam from I-40 E, the more deer you'll find.
Unfortunately, many deer have been killed alongside the interstate. With a 70 mph speed limit on the interstate, not too many people can see a deer at night, especially when the usual fog sets in--and bob-tailed semis are even harder to stop in these situations.
