Bertha Benz

The first car was built by a man. But it was launched by a woman.

Carl Benz had the vision.

But Bertha Bertha had the cash.

In 1870, two years before they married, she used part of her dowry to bail out his failing company.

Then she did it again. And again.

After marriage, she lost her legal right to invest.

But not her influence.

When Carl built his “horseless carriage” in 1885, no one cared.

He was too focused on perfection.

Bertha wanted traction.

So on August 5, 1888, without asking permission, she took the third prototype, grabbed her two teenage sons, and left a note on the kitchen table: they were off to visit grandma in Pforzheim.

66 miles away.

There were no roads.

No gas stations.

And technically, what she was doing was illegal.

But Bertha didn’t care.

She pushed the car out of the workshop to avoid waking Carl.

Then fired up the engine and hit the road.

Dodging cops, skeptics, and superstition (some believed these cars were “devil’s machines”).

On that first-ever long-distance drive, she made history…

She bought fuel from a pharmacy in Wiesloch, creating the world’s first gas station.

She cleared a blocked fuel line with her hat pin.

She insulated a frayed wire with her garter.

She repaired a broken chain at a blacksmith.

She had a cobbler add leather to the wooden brakes, inventing the first brake linings.

And she told Carl to add a third gear, after her sons had to push the car uphill for miles.

The trip took over 12 hours.

When she arrived, she sent Carl a telegram: the drive was a success.

The public was stunned. Newspapers covered it across Germany.

Orders followed. The company took off.

Later, Carl wrote: “Only one person remained with me in the small ship of life when it seemed destined to sink. That was my wife.”

She lived to be 95, outlasting two world wars, rising nationalism, and the collapse of their second company during German hyperinflation.

In 2016, she was inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame, 42 years after Carl.