Who Says Women Can't Drive?

Thought for the day: The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of  age, gender, religion, economic status, or ethnic background, is that, deep down inside, we all believe that we are above-average drivers. [Dave Barry]

Yeah, that's me sitting in the dragster. As you can tell, the car wasn't on the race track, or even on the street. It was parked on a backyard driveway.

And the engine wasn't running.

Come to think of it, that's about the only time Smarticus ever felt comfortable when I was sitting in the driver's seat. That, and the time I drove him home from the hospital while he was still feeling the effects of anesthesia. Okay, okay, okay... I'm not saying I  never earned his misgivings. It's possible that I may have been in a fender-bender or two when I was young and newly-licensed. Smarticus likes to say that when we sold it, there wasn't a single piece of straight metal on the tank of a station wagon I drove back then, but that's a slight exaggeration. The roof looked great.

But this post isn't gonna be about me, or about how our then-toddler son laughed hysterically when my hubby tried to teach me how to drive a stick shift around the parking lot of his workplace. I mean, maybe it WAS a bit of a carnival-like herky-jerky stop-and-go ride, but still, it was terribly rude of him to laugh, dontcha think? Between his laughing and Smarticus' yelling, is it any wonder I never got the hang of it? Anyhow, I'm not gonna write about that, or about my missing sense of direction, either. (I think when God was handing out that particular gene, I never made it to the line, because I got... lost.) So what if I like to take scenic routes?

Some beautiful paths can't be discovered without getting lost. [Erol Ozan]

Anyhow, so what am I gonna write about? Or I should say... who? I'm gonna write about an amazing woman that most of you probably never heard about before.  Her name was Alice Huyler Ramsey, and man oh man, could that woman drive! And find her way around.

[morguefile]

 I guess you could say it all kinda started with a frightened horse. In 1909, her husband John encountered a monstrous driving machine while he was on horseback near their home in Hackensack, New Jersey. His terrified horse took off running, and John started to worry about his wife's safety, should the same thing happen to her. So he bought her a car. A 1909 dark green 4-cylinder, 30 horsepower, Maxwell DA, a touring car with two bench seats, and a removable roof.

[National Automotive History Collection, Detroit Public Library]

She was a natural behind the wheel. In a day and age when driving was still a rarity, in her first summer alone, this 22-year old mother of two put 6000 miles on her new car. Then she took part in a 200-mile endurance race. Representatives of Maxwell were so impressed by her driving skills, they made her an offer she couldn't resist: an all-expenses paid trip to prove to the world that a Maxwell could take anyone... even a woman... all the way across America. To Maxwell, it may have been a publicity stunt, but to Alice, it was a challenge. Her husband agreed to let her go, but he didn't want her to do it alone. He wanted her to take some other women with her.

Good driving has nothing to do with sex. It's all above the collar. [Alice Huyler Ramsey]

[National Automotive History Collection, Detroit Public Library]

Talk about the original girl trip! Two older sisters-in-law and a friend joined her for this incredible 59-day trek across the country. Alice did all of the driving, and the others provided company, and helped as best as they could.

[National Automotive History Collection, Detroit Public Library]

Of the 3800 miles this intrepid foursome covered from Manhattan to San Francisco, only 152 of them were on paved roads.

[National Automotive History Collection, Detroit Public Library]

Which led to eleven flat tires. In addition to the dirty task of changing tires, Alice also cleaned the spark plugs numerous times, and fixed a broken brake pedal. .

[National Automotive History Collection, Detroit Public Library]

Because of all the unpaved roads, it should come as no surprise that Alice's Maxwell bumped over many muddy holes, and got stuck in quite a few of them. In Nebraska, a clever farmer's son used a horse to pull them out of one of those holes... for a fee. When the car bottomed out again a mile farther down the dirt road, he was waiting for them. He happily pulled them out again... for a higher fee, of course.

Since there weren't many decent roads in those days, road maps weren't terribly plentiful, either. They had some from AAA, but for the most part, they navigated by following the telephone poles. They figured the more wires they saw, the more likely it would lead them to a town. This method wasn't fool-proof, though; they had to backtrack on several occasions.

[wikipedia]

Although the ladies spent most nights in a hotel, few offered deluxe accommodations. They may have had sheets on the beds, but some of them also had bedbugs. One night, they had to sleep in the car.  (Yep, it was stuck in another hole.)

In Nevada, they were surrounded by a Native American hunting party on horseback, bows and arrows at the ready. Not to be outdone, in Wyoming, they were waylaid by an armed posse that was chasing a murderer.

[wikipedia]

When they arrived in San Francisco on August 7, 1909, they were met by a cheering crowd. (More women than men, I'll betcha!) Some newspaper articles, however, called the journey ridiculous, and beyond the capabilities of women drivers. 

Her response? The criticism, of course, merely whetted the appetites of those of us who were convinced that we could drive as well as most men... it's been done by men, and as long as they have been able to accomplish it, why shouldn't I?

This feisty woman, Alice Huyler Ramsey, was the first woman in history to drive coast-to-coast across the United States. (And only one man accomplished this feat prior to her: Dr. Horatio Nelson Jackson, in 1903) For Alice, this trip was only the first of many. Between 1909 and 1975, she drove across the country more than thirty more times. (She stopped counting.) In 1960, she was named the Woman Motorist of the Century by AAA, and in 1961, she wrote a book about her cross-country adventures: Veil, Duster, and Tire Iron. In 2000, she became the first woman inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame.

What a gal, huh? Oh, by the way, her husband, who became a U.S. Congressman, never learned to drive.

                             Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

Men may or may not be better drivers than women, but they seem to die more often trying to prove that they are. [Tom Vanderbilt]

I have an idea that the phrase 'weaker sex' was coined by some woman to disarm the man she was preparing to overwhelm. [Ogden Nash]