SPEED QUEENS
This book’s subtitle, A Secret History of Women in Motorsport, says it all. While seemingly every nook and cranny, every hero and zero – and everything in between – of male motorsport has been recalled, the same can’t be said for women’s endeavours in the field. Rachel Harris-Gardiner’s award-winning debut work aims to right that wrong, and it does so with charm, honesty and prodigious research. Unearthing these stories and separating fact from fiction can be a Herculean task. Whether it’s the challenge of tracing a woman’s history because she changed her name upon marriage, or that competitions were inaccurately reported or barely documented at all, a considerable amount of detective work has been invested in this book.
Although not necessarily suppressed, many of these characters have slipped through the cracks of time; this tome is about giving back women’s history and showing it as a complete legacy. The book reveals a rich tapestry of interwoven stories chronicling women’s participation in motoring spectacles and competition, from the earliest days to the present. This egalitarian approach, with a broad geographical spread, is split into thematic chapters presented, approximately, in chronological order. The structure lends itself to recalling both how women competed against and alongside each other, and the supportive networks and rivalries that grew from their participation.
The sheer number celebrated is a reminder that women have had a continuous presence in motorsport, far beyond the handful of widely known names. We’ve heard of Napier works driver and ambassador Dorothy Levitt, championed by Selwyn Edge, but what about her counterpart at Wolseley, June Larkins? Her story is complicated by the fact that she’s sometimes referred to as Jane and doesn’t appear under either name in her family tree, but, as well as competing, she helped Wolseley’s female buyers learn how to drive and maintain their cars. She and many others are given the space to share their stories, as far as they are available, providing a detailed narrative not just of the drivers but of their society, their roles as sportspeople, and how they used their skill and acumen to overcome the challenges they faced.
That idea of being showpeople recalls the first female participants at the dawn of motorsport in 1897, aboard cyclecars and tricycles on which, in France, women from the world of theatre were active. In 1930, the French pairing of Marguerite Mareuse and Odette Siko, in a Bugatti Type 40, finished seventh a
