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On Jan. 15, 1944, while Canada was embroiled in the battle against the Axis powers, the Guelph Mercury published an article that was startling even among the reports of war news. Magistrate Frederick Watt, chairman of the police commission, announced at its inaugural meeting that women would be allowed to drive taxis in Guelph.
Of course, there were already female drivers on Canadian roads, but they were the exception, and the notion that women were bad drivers had been firmly established for a long time. Allegedly, women were terrible drivers because they weren’t cut out for the task of handling cars, being: too emotional to deal with the stress of driving, too likely to faint or swoon in a critical situation, too easily distracted, not intelligent enough for something as complicated as driving and knowing all of the rules of the road, and not physically strong enough to comfortably operate a motor vehicle (there was no power steering or power brakes in those days).
When it came to winter driving, women were supposedly unable to cope with the difficulties of snow and ice. Jokes about dozy female drivers were stock-in-trade for comedians. A classic George Burns and Gracie Allen comedy routine had ditzy Gracie applying for a driver’s licence.
Driving a car was generally considered a man’s job. In most families, even if the wife could drive, whenever she and her husband were both in the car, the driver’s seat was naturally his. A real man didn’t let the little woman drive unless it was really necessary.
There were even more reasons that sitting behind the wheel of a taxi was considered no place for a lady. Besides the hassles of traffic, taxi drivers also had to deal with passengers who could be impatient, short-tempered, foul-mouthed and generally ungentlemanly. There were men who were visitors in town who expected cab drivers to know where to take them if they were looking for a little “action.”
It wasn’t just that nice ladies weren’t supposed to know such places even existed, let alone where to find them; there was also the concern that female cab drivers could be targets for men on the prowl.
The demands of the Second World War changed the situation. So many men were in the armed forces that there was a shortage of labour for jobs that had generally been considered exclusively in the male domain. Women were now doing “men’s work” in factories, on construction sites and in primary industries.
Someone came to the conclusion that if Rosie the Riveter could build ships and tanks, her sisters could drive cabs. Moreover, women were driving trucks and jeeps for the Canadian army and ferrying planes for the Royal Canadian Air Force. (Within a year, young Princess Elizabeth would be serving in the British Women’s Auxiliary Territorial Service as a driver and mechanic.)
The report in the Mercury said:
“Responding to an appeal by two local taxi firms, seeking permission to employ women as drivers because of the shortage of men, the commission agreed to grant the request, as a temporary measure, under specific requirements.”
One requirement was that every applicant for a taxi driver’s licence had to be approved by Guelph Chief of Police Harold Nash, but that was common to communities throughout Ontario. The rule was intended not only to ensure drivers could safely and competently operate a motor vehicle, but to protect the public from “undesirables.” Men with criminal records would usually be denied a taxi driver’s licence.
Another requirement stated that women cab drivers in Guelph would be “restricted to the daytime period of 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.” They wouldn’t be picking up any late-night drinkers for delivery home, or cruising the dark streets with out-of-town visitors in search of “a little action.”
Of course, once women got their foot in the door of the driving profession, they were there to stay, in Guelph and everywhere else; not only in cabs, but in trucks, busses and every other type of vehicle on wheels. Female passengers would often specifically request a woman driver when they phoned for a cab, and there have been examples of taxi companies employing only women drivers.
Statistics compiled by police departments and automobile insurance companies have shown that, far from being the scatter-brained drivers of old jokes, female drivers, generally speaking, get fewer traffic violation tickets than male drivers, are less likely to be involved in traffic accidents than men, and are less likely to drive while under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
Not at all the stereotype caricature of the 1940s.
