FORTY YEARS A TAXI DRIVER

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 27875, 25 January 1956, Page 17

FORTY YEARS A TAXI DRIVER

GREYMOUTH MAN’S RECORD 1,500,000 MILES WITHOUT AN ACCIDENT (From Our Own Reporter) GREYMOUTH, January 23. Between 1.500.000 and 1,750,000 miles of taxi driving without an accident is the proud record of Mr Frank Kennedy, senior driving member of a well-known Greymouth firm of taxi operators, Kennedy Brothers,. Ltd. Mr Kennedy began driving 40 years ago with one of the first cars in the transport firm of which his father, Mr John James Kennedy, and uncle. Mr Martin Kennedy, were the principals. He has driven only seven cars in his long career. The firm of Kennedy Brothers was a pioneer in the transport business on the West Coast. At the end of last century it had about 45 horses, and the vehicles it operated included hansom cabs, landaus, waggonettes, gigs, coaches, and drays. Both passenger and goods services were run. Mr Frank Kennedy can recall occasionally driving some of the horsedrawn vehicles, which were in service well into this century, but he started with the firm as a motor driver. He was one of the first drivers to take a car to Punakaiki on the GreymouthWestport coastal road, and to make the trip through the Greymouth to Hokitika Flowery creek road—the present highway. In 1919 he made an epic trip through the Otira gorge with a sick person, and the journey, which today takes about four and a half hours, took 12 hours. Few cars used the route in those days, and Mr Kennedy’s car had to be towed by horses through several of the creek and river crossings.