Under the hood of historyUnder the hood of history
“Tongues had begun to wag about Eisenhower and his willowy driver, Kay Summersby. Nicknamed Skibereen after her Irish hometown, Summersby had worked in England as a model and movie extra before enlisting as a military driver in London; she had been assigned to Eisenhower the previous summer, joining him in Algiers in mid-January after surviving the U-boat sinking of her transport ship off the African coast. At thirty-four, discreet, divorced, and comely, she served not only as the commander-in-chief’s ‘chauffeuse,’ but also as his bridge partner and riding companion. . . . One drollery circulating in North Africa had the commander-in-chief’s sedan stalling on a lonely road. Summersby tinkers under the hood until Eisenhower appears with the toolbox from the trunk. ‘Screwdriver?’ he supposedly asks, to which she supposedly replies, ‘We might as well. I can’t get the goddam motor fixed.’ ” – Rick Atkinson, An Army at Dawn