IT’S wartime – June, 1943 to be more precise – and women are taking over many traditionally-male roles. Here Inspector Harry Drewett gives some tips to female trainee tram drivers in Glasgow.

Such admirable steps towards equality are somewhat marred by the caption on the back of our photograph, which is credited to the New York Times.

“Now passengers,” it reads, “if you want a smooth run pick the tramcar with the petite driver. The City Corporation of Glasgow, Scotland, have discovered that women make excellent tram-drivers. Their delicacy of touch proves an advantage, the daintiness with which they handle the controls helping the car to glide along with the minimum of jerks and bumps.”

Perhaps the women would have been well able to identify the jerks, as New York parlance might have it.