The city’s oldest hack is Johnnie “Spider” Footman, a cigar-munching 92-year-old from Harlem who’s been on the job since Franklin Roosevelt was in the White House. He has been driving the Yellow Cabs in New York for the last 75-years and is the oldest taxi driver of New York.
He recollects how, in those days, the whites shunned his cab because he was a black as reported in ‘The Telegraph’ dated 9th April 2014.
He recollects that people in those days were more polite and good tippers – he would park his cab at the side of the road and carry their luggage to their rooms. That culture has vanished.
He is 92-years old, loves cigars and is always impeccably dressed.
And – he is not ready to call it quits yet.
But, he is choosy on who he takes as his fare. He drives only on weekends in the early morning time and does not go out of the city or on long routes.
He is as fit as a fiddle – his driving license has been renewed till 2014 – he can hear a whisper from a distance of six feet!!
He began driving in 1937 and, over the years he has taken thousands of persons to various destinations in and around New York. Some of them were celebrities like John Wayne and Rock Hudson.
