Girl Travelers Visit Tampa With Old Car Holding Touring Record

“When she does not go, we push her!”

So a 24-year-old girl declared brightly today, referring to an old car, bearing the scars of travel through 47 countries and now completing the last lap of a journey around the world.

The girl is Capt. Olga Van Driesk, piquant Belgian girl, member of the Wanderwell Work Around the World Educational club, one of four members of the expedition who are taking the Wanderwell II, original car in the World tour, to Henry Ford for his museum.

Captain Olga speaks six languages, French, Dutch, German, English, Spanish, Italian, and, she says, “a little Czech.” It is no wonder that she wanted to see the countries whose languages were almost as familiar as her own.

She was in Venice, fresh from her studies at boarding school, when the Wanderwell expedition came through. Opportunity beckoned and Olga heeded the call with all the enthusiasm of a change-loving nature.

Lizzie Stops.

Later Justine Tibesar joined the travelers in France. The two girls talk easily of world-famous places and world events.

The expedition was in Italy at the height of Fascism; in Hanover when martial law prevailed and food riots and mob spirit menaced safety. Quaint ceremonies in Rumania; Syria, Palestine; opening of the tomb of Tut Ank-Amen; the slow drifts in the Carpathian mountains; sun-scorched deserts; the Orient; Portuguese Africa, and scores of other scenes and places flashed by in kaleidoscopic review, a pageantry of color and, often, hardship.

Sometimes there were highways with no bridges and water buffaloes furnished the power to carry the expedition across; sometimes travel was along bandit-infested trails.

“Once in the mountains in Africa we stop in the middle,” says the young captain in her quaint phraseology. “It runs very well until we are in the middle and then it will not run at all, but some of us got out and give very great pushes until we reach the top!”

Tiger Tracks.

And once the two girls looked out of their tents during a stay in Africa and saw tiger tracks. Only tracks!

“Which,” says the courageous young captain, “was a very good thing for us, for maybe that tiger would not understand any of my six languages!”

There are 100 active members en route on five continents in the expedition, representing many different nationalities, comprising five auto units, two motorcycle units and two bicycle units.

The car which Captain Olga’s unit is taking to Mr. Ford was purchased in 1921 for $50. It was a second hand car, a 1919 model.

Lizzie has given valiant service and the girls declare she has every right to an important place in the Ford museum. Her bones may be creaking, but her spirit is indomitable!

She has been going strong now for many years, setting places.

And, as Captain Olga says, when she will not go “we push her.”

These Two Girls Have Been Places!

[Image caption] They’ve traveled far in an old flivver—but sometimes they had to push!

Left to right, Captain Olga Van Driesk and Justine Tibesar, members of the Wanderwell Work Around the World Educational club. The car which they brought to Tampa has circled the globe in a tour which included 47 countries.

—Photograph by Dorella.

Newspaper:  The Tampa Daily Times, Tampa, Florida, USA 
Date: Wednesday, April 2, 1930 Page: 1