Who should you thank for such amenities in your car as glove boxes, center storage consoles, retractable seat belts, lighted sunshade mirrors and child-proof door locks? Women, of course!
Harley Earl, VP of Design for GM, hired a group of women industrial designers to work on Chevrolet, Buick, Cadillac, Oldsmobile and Pontiac cars.
Their ranks included Suzanne Vanderbilt, Ruth Glennie, Marjorie Ford Pohlman, Jeanette Linder, Sandra Longyear and Peggy Sauer, who worked in GM’s automotive interior-design departments.
There they worked on every interior element (seats, doors, trim, detailing, color and fabrics) except the instrument panel, which was deemed off limits to women.
The other four damsels — Jan Krebs, Dagmar Arnold, Gere Kavanaugh and Jayne Van Alstyne — worked as industrial designers for GM-owned Frigidaire, where they helped create the 1956 Kitchen of Tomorrow.
Thank you ladies, for your visions of the future that we now take for granted.
