A new stream-lined taxi-cab in New York City in 1934. The new vehicle was roomier and more comfortable for passengers than earlier versions.Planet News Archive—SSPL/Getty Images
From horse-drawn carriages to today’s hybrid sedans, New Yorkers have long relied on cabs to get around town. But no cab is more ingrained in city lore than the boxy Checker. And it was on this day, June 18, 1923, that the first one was manufactured at the Checker Cab factory in Kalamazoo, Mich. By 1930, TIME was reporting that Checker would soon control a full 10% of all of the taxis in the nation.
An even higher percentage were Checkers by 1963, when TIME took a look at where they came from:
The roomy Checker cab, one of the few taxis left that passengers can climb into without awkward gymnastics, is a familiar sight on many U.S. streets; of the nation’s 135,000 taxicabs, some 35,000 are Checkers. Less familiar to the public and the financial world is the firm that makes them: closemouthed Checker Motors Corp. of Kalamazoo, Mich.
Separated from the Detroit automotive world by choice and philosophy, Checker is the nation’s smallest full-scale automaker. Last year it turned out 8,000 cars and, for the first time in a decade, showed an operating profit—$559,000 on sales of $23 million. Partly responsible for the profit is the fact that Checker has been doing a tidy business in selling souped-up dressed-up versions of its spartan, boxy cabs as family cars, stationwagons and limousines. The reason for their success (they now account for 40% of production), says Checker President Morris Markin with understandable prejudice, is that riding in many low-slung conventional cars nowadays is “like sitting in a bathtub.”
The good times couldn’t last. In 1982, the company stopped making taxis. It was the end of an era—but, as these photos show, it was just one of many.
All Hail New York Taxis: Gotham Cabs and Cabbies of the 1940s
A New York City doorman flags down a taxi for one of the residents of his building, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesScene in New York City, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesScene in New York City, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesTaxicabs line up for arriving train passengers at (the original) Pennsylvania Station, New York City, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesNew York cabbies sporting their numbered Public Hack Driver badges, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesScene in New York City, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesTaxi "hack stand," New York City, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesTrain passengers wait to take taxi cabs outside (the original) Pennsylvania Station, New York City, 1944.
William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesClose-up of typical cab driver's report including locations and fares collected during his day's work; taxicab drivers lined up at company's garage to turn in money collected in fares during the day (right), New York City, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesMechanics use a hoist to drop in the motor of a taxicab under repair at cab company's maintenance garage, NYC, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesTaxicabs on Park Avenue, NYC, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesScene in New York City, 1944.William C. Shrout—Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesView of a hansom cab, parked at the sidewalk, near Madison Square, New York, 1905. PhotoQuest—Getty ImagesWoman passenger in a 1910 taxi cab, New York.National Motor Museum—Heritage Images/Getty ImagesMiss Maude Odell, one of the first women taxi drivers in New York. She is cranking car (Hub Taxicab Corporation), 1923.Corbis A new stream-lined taxi-cab in New York City in 1934. The new vehicle was roomier and more comfortable for passengers than earlier versions.Planet News Archive—SSPL/Getty ImagesG.H. Brodie, Assistant to the President of Packard Motor Car Co.; Sam Abramson, President of Yale Taxi Co. in New York; and Robert King, President of Packard Federal Corp. (left to right), pictured with the first postwar taxi, in 1946. One of its features was fitting five forward-facing passengers without the usual "jump seats."Bettmann—CorbisRepresentative models of the three makes of autos which meet the new specifications for service as New York taxi cabs get a going-over by officials at the Police Division of Licenses Headquarters, July 15, 1954. Left to right, the new stock model small taxis expected to be on the streets by July 16th are: A Chevrolet, a Plymouth, and a Ford.Bettmann—CorbisTwo women getting into the first British-built Austin taxi licensed in New York, 1960.Hulton Archive—Getty ImagesTaxis are seen in mid-Manhattan, New York, Nov. 17, 1970. Marty Lederhandler—AP PhotoA checkered cab is pulled over on New York's Central Park South, May 4, 1982, right around the time that the Checkered Motor Co. announced it was going out of production. G. Paul Burnett—AP PhotoTaxis move through a traffic lane in New York City, 1995James Leynse—CorbisIn 2011, the Taxi and Limousine Commission along with New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg annouced the Nissan NV200 has been chosen as the winner of the Taxi of Tomorrow competition and will become the City’s exclusive taxicab for a decade. City of New York—Getty Imagea