Jill Scott (racing driver)

Jill Scott (1902–1974) was a British racing driver and aviator. She was described as "swashbuckling" and was a distinctive figure in motor racing, dressed in cherry-red from head-to-toe whenever she appeared at the race track.[1]

She was born Eileen May Fountain in 1902 into a family made wealthy from their coal businesses.[1][2]

Along with her first husband, William Berkeley "Bummer" Scott, she lived in a large house near the Brooklands race track in Surrey, England, and the couple were early and enthusiastic collectors of automobiles.[2] They bought their first Sunbeam Indianapolis shortly after their marriage and quickly added several Bugattis to their collection.[2] Their cars all wore a distinctive black livery with emerald green wheels, and the couple collected frequent trophies racing their Bugattis at the nearby track.[2] Following the death of J. G. Parry-Thomas, they bought two of his cars, one of which Scott used to exceed 120 miles-per-hour on the Brooklands track, granting her the right to display a coveted British Automobile Racing Club badge acknowledging the achievement.[2][1] In 1928 she became the first woman elected to the British Racing Drivers' Club.[1]

In 1930 she divorced William and married another driver, Ernest Mortimer Thomas, who was also a former RAF pilot.[2][1] Scott herself had learned to fly a few years earlier, in 1927, and operated an Avro Avian.[2][1] She and her new husband continued to race at Brooklands for many years, her in an Alfa Romeo and him in a Frazer Nash.[2]

Scott died in 1974. Thomas died a few months later.[1]