New York's Electric Taxis of 1897: The Forgotten First Fleet

New York’s first motorized taxis were electric. In 1897, the Electric Carriage and Wagon Company, founded by engineer Henry Morris and chemist Pedro Salom, put a small fleet of battery-powered hansom cabs, based on their Electrobat design, into service in Manhattan. Their business grew into the Electric Vehicle Company, which ran hundreds of electric cabs and even used a battery-swapping station to keep them moving. Management problems and competition from gasoline taxis ended the venture by around 1907 — more than a century before electric cabs returned.

At a glance

The Electrobat

Morris and Salom built the Electrobat in Philadelphia in the mid-1890s. Their cabs looked like horse-drawn hansom cabs, with the driver seated high at the back, but were powered by heavy lead-acid batteries and electric motors. They were quiet, clean and easy to drive in city traffic.

Battery swapping

Charging took hours, so the company built a station where discharged batteries could be exchanged quickly for charged ones — an idea revived by some electric vehicle companies more than a century later.

Growth and collapse

Investors merged the business into the Electric Vehicle Company, which planned fleets in several cities. But costs were high, batteries were heavy and short-lived, and management overextended the company. Gasoline taxis with meters arrived in 1907, and the electric cab era ended. Read the history of electric cars.

The first speeding arrest and fatality

Electric taxis were involved in two New York firsts in 1899: the first known speeding arrest and the first recorded U.S. pedestrian death involving a motor vehicle. Read the first speeding arrest and Henry Bliss.

Electric cabs today

Electric and hybrid vehicles are again common in New York’s for-hire fleets, and city policies encourage more. Read electric vs gas luxury cars.