An Autocar Great Woman of a century ago

AUTOCAR RECENTLY HONOURED the female high-fliers of the British automotive industry at our annual Great Women awards ceremony.

- KRIS CULMER

Even in the very earliest days of motoring, there were a number of pioneering women. But very few are widely known today, so let me introduce you to one who achieved several significant firsts: Vera Hedges Butler.

She was born in London in 1881 to a wine merchant father, Frank, who in 1897 became one of the first people in Britain to buy a car (a Benz). Through the embryonic Royal Automobile Club, Frank met aristocratic young engineer Charles Rolls (who had bought his own first car, a Peugeot, two years prior, aged 18). Both men would take part in the 1000 Miles Trial of April 1900, a massed journey from London up to Edinburgh and back designed to prove that cars were better than horse-drawn vehicles to the many naysayers (ahem). Bear in mind that cars back then were complex, frail, puny carts using mostly unmetalled roads. Vera, aged 19, went with her father in his 6hp Panhard, which was one of 17 cars to finish. Just one other woman was present - as was Lord Iliffe, publisher of a five-year-old newspaper named The Autocarwhile the gold medal was won by Rolls, driving another Panhard.