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Next time you’re cut up by a learner driver or held up as they demonstrate – oh so slowly – how not to reverse into a parking space, try to be patient. They’re only doing what the rest of us had to do to earn our licences and this year they’re unwittingly marking one of the most important motoring milestones; the centenary of the first official driving lesson. It was given in 1910 near Peckham in south London by doctor’s son Stanley Roberts. He realised that motoring was going to be big business and set up his own driving school before naming it – rather grandly – the British School of Motoring. Now known simply as BSM, it’s the biggest driving school in Britain….Learning to drive in 1910, when cars often resembled horseless carriages, was far harder work physically than today. There was no power steering, making it essential that learners turned the wheel using the laborious “push-pull” method still advocated in some circles. Starting the engine required a deft combination of mechanical understanding and brute force (starting handles were the order of the day) and brakes were rod-operated, heavy and ineffective compared to the servo-assisted systems we take for granted. More