Who Were the First Female Taxi Drivers of Paris?

Madame Decourcelle.

Paris is a city of many stories, Olympic and otherwise, including the legacy of some of the first female taxi drivers at the dawn of the 20th century. The taxi cab is a ubiquitous city sight even today. While women have always been a minority in the field of taxi drivers, they have participated since the beginning of driving motor cars for hire. In 1908, the same year the Ford Model T would roll off assembly lines to make history in America, two exceptional Parisian women paved the way for female taxi drivers. Mademoiselle Gaby Pohlen and Madame Inès Decourcelle defied gender stereotypes to establish themselves in a man's driving world.

Gaby Pohlen was a daredevil who enjoyed traveling, riding bikes, and driving cars. According to The Motor-Car Journal in 1908, she began driving in 1902. To drive a taxi cab, as motorized cars began to take on this previously horse-drawn role, she would need to be both licensed and hired by a taxi company. Pohlen received her license to drive a motor taxi in 1908, but as she told the reporter for the magazine, the trouble was getting hired. After repeated rejections, she was at last accepted by a cab company. She became one of the first female motor cab drivers in history, joined by Madame Inès Decourcelle also in 1908. There appears to be some debate over which woman technically hit the streets first, but certainly, both were pioneers.

In 1908, Pohlen expressed a desire to drive in a “speed race.” Whether she ever managed this feat or not, female drivers were edging into a man's world as more and more people purchased cars. In 1909, Dorothy Levitt published a “chatty” manual for female motorists. Levitt was a champion car and boat racer, and she became a champion of women drivers.

Her work and the pioneering female taxi drivers of Paris were conscious of the bold new frontiers open to women who had the skill and daring to drive their own cars. While cars remain a stereotypically male passion today, a long history of women loving the freedom and speed of the open road or making their living on wheels makes the history of the car equally a woman's tale.