Louisette Texier

 

Louisette (right) with Annie Soisbault and Germaine Rouault

Louisette Texier was an Armenian-French driver and rally navigator in the 1950s and ‘60s. 

Her ten-year driving career began when she was in her mid-forties and running her own clothes shop. She had been born in central Turkey to Armenian parents and her birth name was Arpine Hovanessian. Evacuated to Greece and then to Marseille, she escaped the 1915 Armenian genocide which claimed her father. Her mother also survived, but the two did not meet one another again until Arpine was an adult. At the age of 15, she left school and became a showgirl in Paris. This may well have been when she changed her name. She would have been a contemporary to the likes of Helle Nice and perhaps saw her compete in the Coupe des Artistes. A much later meeting with Grand Prix driver Jean Behra during a visit to Montlhery in 1955 is said to have been her inspiration to take up motorsport herself.

An ambitious competitor nicknamed the Bulldozer, her first major rally was the 1958 Acropolis, which she tackled in a Simca Aronde Montlhery model. This was a car she was already familiar with, having co-driven for Germaine Rouault in one for the 1956 Monte Carlo Rally. She had raced a slightly different model on track during the same season, finishing sixth in class in the Coupes de Vitesse at Montlhery. Later in the year, she was thirteenth in the Coupe de Salon, held at the same circuit.

The 1956 races were the only times she took to the circuits for dedicated races, but she got more experience of the French tracks during the Tour de France. She entered four times between 1961 and 1964, as both co-driver to Annie Soisbault and named driver. In 1961, she drove an Alfa Romeo Giulietta, and in 1964, a Jaguar MkII. Her co-driver both times was Marie-Louise Mermod of Switzerland. On the other two occasions she navigated for Annie Soisbault, also in a Jaguar. 

The Monte Carlo Rally was another favourite. She first entered in 1959, still driving a Simca Aronde. Louisette and co-driver Francoise Archambault narrowly missed the cut to enter the final leg and finished 106th overall. She switched to a Renault Dauphine in 1960, but she and Helene Cherret did not finish. Driving an Alfa Romeo Giulietta and Renault 8 respectively, she entered again in 1961 and 1964. 

As well as events, Louisette was quite loyal to team-mates. Between 1960 and 1963, she co-drove for Annie Soisbault in the Tour de France and in French rallies such as the 1960 Stuttgart-Charbonnieres event, where they shared an Alfa Romeo. Marie-Louise (or Mary Lou) Mermod was another regular colleague; she navigated for Louisette in the 1962 Monte and the 1964 Tour de France, then Louisette returned the favour for the Geneva Rally in 1964. They were 30th in an Alfa Romeo.

Louisette was also a participant in the Paris-St. Raphaël womens' rally, in which she used a Renault Dauphine in 1962.

Her last rally was the Rallye du Maroc in 1968. She drove a Renault 8 Gordini but joined a lengthy list of non-finishers.

She died aged 108 in 2021. In her final years, she achieved some fame in France due to her great age, adventurous life and wartime heroics in the French resistance, helping to hide Jewish families. She worked in womenswear retail until she was 92 and enjoyed karting with her grandchildren and great-grandchildren when she was even older.

For an interview with Louisette as an old lady, click here.

Image copyright Le Monde

Women Drivers in the 12 Hours of Reims

Isabelle Haskell and Annie Bousquet with their Porsche in 1956

The 12 Hours of Reims was a major sportscar race that ran, on and off, between 1953 and 1967. It was held at the Reims-Gueux circuit in France, and was a round of the World Sportscar Championship (or the World Championship for Makes) between 1953 and 1965.

It is significant for the 1956 edition, during which Annie Bousquet was killed in a crash early on. This accident, and the negative publicity that stemmed from it, was the cause of women drivers being banned from major circuit races in France until the early 1970s, although the ban at Reims itself was lifted much earlier.

1953

Yvonne Simon/Jean Hémard (Panhard Monopole) – 14^th

1954

Gilberte Thirion/Olivier Gendebien (Gordini T15S) – 14^th

1955

Race cancelled

1956

Gilberte Thirion/Roger Loyer (Gordini T15S) – DNF

1500cc:

Gilberte Thirion/Roger Loyer (Gordini T15S) – DNF

Annie Bousquet/Isabelle Haskell (Porsche 550) – DNF

1957

No female entries

1958

No female entries

1959-1963

No race held

1964

Annie Soisbault/Claude Dubois (Porsche 904) – 13^th

1965

Annie Soisbault/Gérard Langlois van Ophem (Ferrari 250 LM) – DNF

1966

No race held

1967

No female entries

(Image from http://type550.com/)

Annie Soisbault (de Montaigu)

Annie competing in the Alpine Rally in her TR3

Annie Soisbault competed in rallies and races across Europe, between 1956 and 1969. She had always been interested in sports from an early age, but her first love was tennis: she was one of France’s leading junior players of her time, winning seven titles. She continued to play professionally as a senior, and is meant to have used some of her winnings to buy her first sports car, a Delahaye.

Her first international event was the 1956 Monte Carlo Rally, in a Simca. Her role was as a “second driver”, more or less a back-seat passenger to Germaine Rouault and Louisette Texier. She remained on the back seat from Munich until the Ardeche, where the team struggled with heavy snow. Annie demanded a go at the wheel, and surprised her more experienced team-mates by setting some good times and passing several other drivers. However, her heroics were not enough to save them, and they were still unclassified.

In 1957, she took to the stages in her own Triumph TR3. The biggest rally she entered (and not strictly a rally) was the Tour de France, and she was 21st overall, driving with Michèle Cancre. There were 23 finishers that year. In the same car, she entered the Coupes de Salon at Montlhéry, and was eighth in her race.

In a Panhard Dyna belonging to her co-driver, Monique Bouvier, she also entered the Mille Miglia. They lasted a little over half of the distance, before a problem with a piston put them out.

She became a Triumph works driver in 1958, using a TR3. The story goes that the Triumph motorsport team were considering Annie or Pat Moss for a works drive. Annie told them that she was not interested in working with indecisive people, and they signed her forthwith. It is unclear how much truth is in this story. Annie had a talent for self-promotion; an example of this is her appearance in the promotional Shell film “Coupe des Alpes”, which featured some competition footage and some staged sequences, and was shown on television. She was also regarded by some of her peers as “difficult”.

That year, she seems to have finished the Monte Carlo Rally with Tish Ozanne, albeit unplaced. She also entered the Alpine Rally, but retired due to mechanical problems. The Tour de France was a happier hunting ground. She was fourteenth overall with Michèle Cancre.

In 1959, she continued with the TR3, coming to the UK for the RAC Rally. Co-driven by Val Domleo, she finished, but was unplaced. It had been a similar story on the Monte, although Nadège Ferrier took the co-driver’s seat. Once again, she did not finish the Alpine Rally. Her biggest result was her win on the Paris-St. Raphaël women’s rally, which contributed towards her European Ladies’ Rally Championship title. This award was not without controversy; Annie seems to have exploited a loophole in the rules about the number of female participants in an event for a Coupe des Dames to be awarded, non-starting on some rallies in order to deny Ladies’ points to Pat Moss, her main rival apart from Ewy Rosqvist, who was joint winner. This behaviour did not endear her to other competitors, or to observers. 

In more sportscar-oriented competition, she was thirteenth in the Tour de France, once more with Michèle Cancre as co-driver.

1960 saw her association with Triumph coming to an end. She failed yet again to finish the Alpine Rally, this time with Annie Spiers. Throughout her career, Annie preferred to work with other female drivers. This was true in both rallies and races. This year, she revisited her partnership with Michèle Cancre for the Tour de France, and was 16th. Their car was a Porsche 356B. Earlier in the season, driving solo, Annie had attempted the Coupes de Vitesse at Montlhéry, and was thirteenth in a Triumph. At some point during 1960, she travelled to Brazil for the Rio de Janeiro Grand Prix, and was seventh in a sportscar race, driving a Porsche 1600. This season, she also sampled single-seater racing in a Lola Formula Junior, which she used in some Formula Three races in France.

Increasingly, she favoured sportscar events and road races over stage rallying, and this seems to have been her main focus for most of the 1960s. She took part in the Tour de France on several more occasions, with a best result of sixth in 1963, driving a Jaguar, the same car in which she had failed to finish in 1962. She also scored her best result in the Monte Carlo Rally, fourteenth, in a DKW, with P. Gele, but seemingly as a navigator.

She was fourth in the 3000cc GT class the following year, in a Ferrari 250 GTO. Her overall position was fourteenth, and her co-driver was Nicole Roure. Driving a different Ferrari, an LM run by Ecurie Francorchamps, she was 18th in the Paris 1000km, driving with Guy Ligier. Her main car that year was a Porsche 904. In it, she was thirteenth in the Rheims 1000km, with Claude Dubois, and sixth in the Paris GP at Montlhéry. She is known to have entered the Dakar 6 Hours, but the result has been lost.

The Ecurie Francorchamps Ferrari was her main mount for 1965. In it, she entered the Monza 1000km, Spa 500km and Rheims 12 Hours, but did not finish any of them, due to mechanical failures and one accident, at Rheims. Her only good result came in the Paris GP, where she won the GT class in her own Ferrari GTO. In the same GTO, she also attempted a round of the French national rally championship, but did not finish.

She drove a Porsche 906 in 1966, staying in France this time. She is known to have entered the Coupe de Vitesse and the Coupe du Salon, but the results are not forthcoming. A scheduled appearance in the Paris 1000km did not happen. After this, Annie became very much an occasional racer, and concentrated on her professional role as managing director of an upmarket motor dealership, importing Aston Martin and other marques to France. The business belonged to her husband, the Marquis de Montaigu.

Her last major appearances were at the Mont Ventoux hillclimb. She had been a regular at the big climbs since at least 1960, having crashed her Ferrari GTO there in 1965. In ‘66, she was not among the major finishers, but did become the first female driver to average over 100kph, driving a Porsche 906. In 1967, she won the Ladies’ Cup in the same car. She retired completely from motorsport in 1969.

Annie was a fascinating character, a sporting adventuress more in the style of Hellé Nice and Kay Petre, than her contemporaries. She is famous for her pet cheetah, which she sometimes brought with her to rallies for photo opportunities, and for her reputation as a bonne vivante, who enjoyed the finer things in life. Her furious competitive streak was not enough to land her the overall victories of a Pat Moss or Rosemary Smith, but her media-mindedness ensured that she was noticed everywhere.

She died in September 2012, aged 78.

Thanks to members of the TNF forum for information.

(Photo from http://www.forum-auto.com/sport-auto/histoire-du-sport-auto/sujet343197-2800.htm)