When Mary Barra was appointed CEO of General Motors in January of 2014, she made history as the first female chief executive of a major global automaker. An engineer who started her career with GM at the age of 18, Barra’s experience is a sterling example of a woman who has shattered the glass ceiling in an otherwise male-dominated industry.
By contrast, in the 1950s, female voices were largely absent from the automotive industry despite the key role women were playing in car-purchasing decisions. Harley Earl, then VP of Design and Styling for GM, recognized this as he developed an industrial design curriculum with Pratt Institute professor Alexander Kostellow. So, Earl made a concentrated effort to recruit female graduates from design schools as he assembled a collective of young industrial designers.
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These “damsels of design,” as Earl deemed them, included Jane Van Alstyne, Dagmar Arnold, Ruth Glennie, Gere Kavanaugh, Jan Krebs, Jeanette Linder, Sandra Longyear, Marjorie Ford Pohlman, Helene Pollins, Peggy Sauer, and Suzanne Vanderbilt. Though not exterior car designers, these women worked from GM’s styling studios, where they were tasked with designing everything from car interiors to exhibitions and even the Kitchen of Tomorrow for GM’s former appliance subsidiary, Frigidaire.
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For most of these industrial designers (who reportedly resented being referred to as damsels of design), their work would culminate in 1958’s Spring Fashion Festival of Women-Designed Cars held in the first-of-its-kind dome at the GM Tech Center in Warren, Michigan. This “feminine auto show” saw the women redesigning the interiors of 10 existing vehicles with fabrics, paint colors, and accessories that blurred the lines between fashion (think pearl-lined seating and nylon-friendly upholstery) and function (from notepads and vanity cases built into glove compartments to umbrellas hidden in passenger doors).
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Among other highlights was Jeanette Linder’s Impala Martinique convertible and its matching luggage set. Another was Peggy Sauer’s Oldsmobile Carousel station wagon, which included child-centric design elements, such as a magnetic game board (to be attached to the back of the front seat) and parental dashboard controls for the rear doors and windows.
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Earl’s retirement in late 1958 signaled the end of an era for all but one of these women, as his successor, Bill Mitchell, soon disbanded the group. Suzanne Vanderbilt was the lone woman who remained, overseeing total car design as chief designer for the Chevrolet II studio before becoming a design assistant leading interior soft trim for all GM’s lines.
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Still, these industrial designers have earned a special place in American history for comprising what is considered the first prominent all-female design team. To have accomplished that in an industry defined by power and progress, no less, they’re in a class of their own.
This article is part of a series highlighting March as Women’s History Month. Read more, here.