Which woman completed the first long-distance journey by automobile in 1888?

Bertha Benz completed the first long-distance journey by automobile in 1888.

On 5 August 1888, Benz drove from Mannheim to Pforzheim in Germany with her sons Richard and Eugen. She used a Benz Patent-Motorwagen, generally identified as the Model 3, covering roughly 104 to 106 kilometres. Earlier automobile demonstrations had been short trials, so her journey showed that a motor car could serve as practical transportation rather than merely as an experimental machine.

The trip was also an ingenious field test. Benz bought ligroin, a petroleum solvent used as fuel, from a pharmacy in Wiesloch. She cleared a blocked fuel line with a hatpin, insulated a wire with a garter, and had a blacksmith repair a chain. When the wooden brakes wore down, a cobbler fitted leather to them, helping establish the idea of brake lining.

Benz’s journey generated valuable publicity for Carl Benz’s invention and exposed improvements the vehicle needed, including stronger brakes and lower gearing for hills. It is sometimes described as the first road trip, though the historic claim specifically concerns the first substantial journey by an internal-combustion automobile.