For those members of the middle class who could or would not afford a horse, carriage, and stable, hack drivers were plentiful. At first, most of these drivers were African Americans, who were licensed to drive by the city in the early nineteenth century. By the 1840s, as was the case with many semi-skilled and unskilled occupations, Irish immigrants pushed African Americans out of the trade. This early example of ethnic succession was more violent than later transitions, but it established a tradition of entering immigrant groups viewing hacking as a viable income and significant step up the ladder of economic mobility. Drivers toiled behind the wheel hoping that their sons could find better work. A second innovation was organizational. While African American drivers were primarily small entrepreneurs, the new Irish drivers did not own their rigs or horses and worked for wages for sizable fleets. The 1855 census counted 805 Irish coachmen and hack drivers, a figure that overshadowed 57 Germans and Anglo-Americans and scattered other nationalities. The Irish continued to dominate hacking and other street trades over the course of the nineteenth century.

By the Civil War, fleets of several hundred hacks operated in the city streets. The reputation of hackmen was dubious. In the 1880s, hacks and cabs that traveled the city streets at night were called "nighthawks" and were notorious for preying on their customers. Their bad reputation came from cheating fares and from servicing nocturnal vice. There were also controversies over business methods; disputes over monopolistic behavior around key hotel doors were chronic. New Yorkers were accustomed to payment methods, at least. Fares based upon distance were not new, having been employed since mid-century.

Gas power was not the first innovation in cabs. Previously, steam-powered automobiles had failed to attract consumer interest. Electric cabs had showed some promise; since July of 1897, twelve electric hansom cabs (an early innovation combining speed and safety), had plied the city streets. Organized by the Electric Carriage and Wagon Company, these novelty cabs competed with horse-drawn hacks. Despite their technological innovation, called by Scientific American in a March 1909 article "one of the most significant facts of city transportation," electric cabs varied only slightly in performance and appearance from horse-drawn vehicles. Scientific Magazine preferred the electric cab because it was silent and odorless. Even though the Electric Vehicle Company expanded its New York fleet to sixty-two in 1898 and then to one hundred the next year, its overall success was short-lived. Electric cabs were cumbersome, were unable to move faster than fifteen miles per hour, and required a battery recharge every twenty-five miles that took eight hours to complete. This problem limited use of electric taxis to single rides and made cruising impossible. Changing a battery also required use of an overhead crane and a spacious garage. Replacing the pneumatic tires required taking off the entire wheel disk, which caused further delays. Despite the clean and silent operation, passenger comfort was minimal. Fares sat in an open seat in the front of the cab, while the driver perched overhead. The brakes were applied forward, which in emergency situations meant that the entire car might topple over. Not surprisingly, electric cabs did not catch on. One contemporary writer observed that many people took one ride but rarely returned for a second, preferring horse-drawn hacks. A fire settled the issue. In January 1907, the Electric Carriage and Wagon Company went under when three hundred of its cabs burned in a garage fire.

In their infancy, gas-powered cabs were but slight improvements over their predecessors. Besides their uncertain safety, the two-cylinder cabs had other limitations. A common model known as the Maxwell was noisy and would not go more than five miles before grease fouled the spark plugs. Its cab lamps blew out any time a wind rose. There were similar problems with the Pierson cab. One veteran cabby recalled, "I had to wrap a blanket around my legs to keep warm. I used to wear goggles to keep the dust out of my eyes and, boy, when the sun was hot, it cut a hole through the top of the car and roasted a fellow alive." Still, the cabby, Emil Hendrickson, thought it was easier in the old days, when "a fellow got big tips and didn't have to push a hack for sixteen hours; when he didn't have to fracture his skull climbing over a cab in front of him; when the streets weren't crowded with trucks and cars." Hendrickson acknowledged that the Pierson was unreliable. On one occasion, the boss told him to get out the banana oil and shine the cab for a party of five. Over the Manhattan Bridge they went. At Forty-second Street and Fifth Avenue, the car stalled. Hendrickson and two of the gentlemen got out and pushed. A water belt slapped one of them and turned his fancy white shirt red. The trip from Brooklyn to Riverside Drive took nine hours. When the "quality people" came out of their dinner, the bearings on the car burned out. A tow truck took until 3 a.m. to arrive. Even then, the boss charged the passengers twenty-five dollars. Hendrickson wrote that he would not have blamed them if they had refused to pay anything.

Hendrickson recalled outwitting one of the three traffic cops in town. He received a ticket when his Steamer cab began to smoke on a back road in Brooklyn. The policeman ticketed him because the smoke hid the license plate numbers. In court, Hendrickson pointed out that the smoke was steam, and that "it is white and it evaporates." Case dismissed.

By the arrival of Allen's taxi drivers, the New York cabby had evolved into, as one observer put it, "an efficient race." Journalist Vince Thompson noted how the cabby displayed his considerable self-respect by bowling down the street and pushing aside other vehicles. Thompson regarded the world of hacking as "loose and lawless," and recommended that aspiring young men learn to drive cabs as a lesson in how to gain life goals ruthlessly and without rules. His complaints had the ring of truth. While the city aimed to license public hacks, thousands of other unlicensed drivers roamed the streets making up their own fares. Getting a license was no problem either. A man could "come out of Sing Sing [prison]," get "two greasy letters of recommendation," and obtain a license without the least background check. Thompson concluded that the "New York cabbie was the most slovenly in the world."



