By Sorrel Hoskin

Break downs, bumpy roads, flat tyres and frightened horses... the pioneer motorists of Taranaki faced more than a drop or two of trouble.

But Dr H.B Leatham liked a challenge. Acknowledged as the pioneer of motoring in New Plymouth he heralded in the new century by buying New Plymouth's first petrol driven car, a Curved Dash Oldsmobile, in 1903.

Prior to this Taranaki's first "horseless carriages" had been the steam cars assembled by AW Reid of Stratford. Steam was on its way out however, and petrol soon took over.

Dr Leatham, the surgeon in charge at New Plymouth hospital, was a forward thinking man who introduced the whole district to the challenge of the motoring age, whether they were ready for it or not. In his own words the car was "the terror of all the horses for miles." 

The Taranaki Herald (5 October 1903) saw the danger that was to come :

"A motor-car was landed on Friday for Dr Leatham who was to be seen driving it on his rounds today. Others, we believe, will shortly be in use here and in view of this fact, owners of horses and those in charge of them will need to exercise more care than sometimes they are accustomed to use. It is a common thing to see horses attached to tradesmen's carts standing quite unattended in the streets. This at any time is a reprehensible practice, and now that motorcars promise to come into general use it becomes dangerous. Horseless vehicles are certain to come more and more into use, and their presence must be looked for and the danger of timid horses provided against."

First assembly line car

The Curved Dash Oldsmobile, named for the unique shape of its footboard, had a single cylinder four horse power engine, two forward speeds and a reverse gear. To steer drivers grasped a tiller poking out of the dash, starting the car involved cranking a handle by the driver's side.

An Oldsmobile. Photo: Southward Car Museum.

The Oldsmobile was built using the first progressive assembly system - the beginning of the assembly line system - allowing the American company to produce 3,924 cars in 1903 and offer the vehicles at a rate of US $600 around the world.

Adventurous Driving

The Curved Dash's top speed was around 40 kph - but only on really good days. Usually the vehicle was fraught with problems, making it up the steepest hills in town just one of the difficulties it faced.

Dr Leatham's daughter Constance wrote in her diary: "to make the benzene run better we often used to go up the hills backwards which seemed to do the trick.

"Father would take us for drives on Sunday afternoons when the weather was fine, but the roads were not very good and it was not always comfortable… Once we lost a passenger - Miss Beatrice Campbell had been sitting in the back seat. Father turned his head to make some remark and meeting no response looked around and found no Miss C. She had been tossed overboard and was left about half a mile away, at the foot of Standish Hill, but was picked up none the worse."

Driving the little car was a tad hazardous, the driver and passengers really needed to have a sense of adventure, and not be in any hurry to get to their destination.

The Leatham family on a Sunday drive in the Oldsmobile.

On one occasion the doctor was driving down St Aubyn Street when the flywheel came off, cartwheeled away and was lost. Another time the car burst into flames in the middle of town. Luckily, the blaze was extinguished before any major damage was done.

As Murray Moorhead noted in Tales of North Taranaki (1991) "Dr Leatham was a very popular man as a healer, but behind the wheel of his Oldsmobile he sometimes went down very quickly in the popularity stakes.

"His car was so noisy that he was rarely able to complete even the shortest of trips without having to stop and switch off the motor for a few minutes while a skittish horse was calmed and led past.

"Dr Leatham claimed to have caused only one equine disaster during his entire driving career. But that was a humdinger! The horse that bolted had a fully loaded milk wagon on behind it which managed to demolish a considerable amount of roadside property before its final disintegration and the horse came to a stop."

BYO repair kit

The driver of the Oldsmobile had to set out with repair kits of gargantuan proportions, to cover any potential breakdown. It was a rare trip when the doctor did not have to stop at least once on the journey to do some repair work on the car.

The car's tyres were pneumatic but had no inner tube. When the tyre went flat with a puncture the driver had to sift through a box full of various sized rubber plugs until he found the right size to block the hole, before pumping it up again.

If the tyre was ruined then a rope had to be wound round and round the wheel rim - acting as a temporary, albeit rather bumpy, tyre for the trip homeward.

Driving out of town presented a whole new set of problems. The roads often diminished into mere cart tracks with potholes, deep rutted tracks and mud puddles. A Sunday drive into the country could turn into a major undertaking - often having to dig the car out of a bog.

Dr and Mrs Leatham drive through New Plymouth in the Oldsmobile.

The doctor persisted with the cantankerous little car, but admitted that if he had an urgent medical case to visit he would take a horse drawn gig rather than risk a break down.

A new car, a new record

By 1907 Dr Leatham had upgraded to a two-cylinder Reynolds-Jackson. Other doctors (Walker and Fookes) had also caught onto the car craze and purchased De Dion-Bouton cars that same year. These cars were more reliable than the Oldsmobile or the Reynolds-Jackson.

Dr Walker boasted that his car drove 128,000 kilometres without seriously letting him down. He drove it around Mount Taranaki in a record-breaking time of six and a half hours.

There were no tests for driving and very few road rules, so the driver had to learn as he went. Petrol in 1907 cost about 17 shillings an eight gallon (40 litre) container.

By the time the First World War had finished motor cars had established themselves firmly in New Plymouth. Although they were still too expensive for many people they were no longer a novelty and horses and their owners had learned to live with them.