Hey, taxi! Doyle's marks 115 years in the business
By Steven P. Wagner
The Forum - 08/07/1999

Public transportation has been an integral part of life in the Fargo-Moorhead area nearly since the communities were born.

The taxi cab industry dates back 115 years when W.H. Doyle hauled passengers for hire in horse-drawn carriages as part of his dray business.

Eventually, Doyle had a full-fledged taxi service in operation and laid the foundation to Doyle's Yellow Checker Cab Inc., now a family business spanning three generations.

Jim Peinovich, president of Doyle's, grew up around the business.

His grandfather, Pete Garberg, bought into Doyle's in 1937. For Garberg, a U.S. district attorney at the time, it was just another business venture.

But when Mike Peinovich, Jim's father, returned from his military service in 1947, Doyle's became a family business.

As a child, Jim Peinovich began working in the mechanical shop and performing janitorial duties.

"I grew up around the shop," Peinovich recalls, a smile running across his face. "I've been working there since I was 13."

He chuckles about being a "low-level employee."

"It was fun, but it was basically summer jobs," he said. "The fun was learning to work on vehicles."

Now he owns and operates a taxi service that maintains a fleet of 25 cars and employs 75 people.

For decades, the taxi business was a fierce industry and taxi car licenses were often debated at Fargo City Council meetings. In 1938, there were seven companies between Fargo and Moorhead.

In 1972, the three remaining companies, including Konen Cab Co. and City Cab, merged under Doyle's roof. The move proved to be a crucial turning point in a struggling industry.

"You had a couple of companies losing money," Peinovich said. "It allowed one company to expand its customer base" and remain in business.

"Sooner or later, each one would have dropped out of business," he said.

Although Doyle's provided some of the area's first taxi service as early as 1884, it wasn't until 1889 that public transportation received the boost it needed to become a viable industry.

That year, North Dakota was admitted to the United States union as a dry state. Across the river in Moorhead, saloons were big business. Moorhead had 45 saloons by the late 1890s, despite a population of about 4,500, and Fargo's transportation companies relied on shuttling locals looking for a drink.

By Thanksgiving Day in 1903, Northern Electric initiated the Fargo-Moorhead Street Railway.

World Book Encyclopedia credited Fargo and Moorhead as the first cities to use electric transportation. The system thrived from the late 1910s to the early 1930s.

"Nobody drove. Nobody had licenses. It was a different life," said Peinovich.

Automobiles were a lot less common, mainly because of World War I and the manufacturing of weaponry, he said.

The demand for taxi service increased during the 1930s as the elderly, handicapped and business travelers all relied on taxis to shuttle them to their destinations.

Those customers are still integral to the cab business, but refugees now provide a large percentage of Doyle's clientele. "The city is changing, and you see those changes," Peinovich said. "I think they happen to be a pleasant addition to the community."

Doyle's fills an important role in meeting the demand for social service clients to shop and attend meetings and medical appointments, he said.

"It has become an essential part of the community. It's a niche," Peinovich said. "It serves both cities. It serves all segments of the communities. ... What we're trying to do is provide a network to get people where they need to go."

Peinovich, who graduated in 1983 from the University of North Dakota, said the family business was the perfect fit because he was looking to gain management experience and his father needed help. He never left the business and soon realized how much he liked Fargo.

"I was going to work two years (at Doyle's)," Peinovich said. "Now it's been 17.

"We found its a great place to raise our kids. Can't ask for much more than that."

Peinovich said his father was a visionary. "I basically primed the pump," he said.

Doyle's success, though, has been noticed nationally.

The peak taxi cab season in the northern United States runs from Nov. 15 to March 15 each winter.

"The majority of our business is in those four months. We do 50 percent of our business," Peinovich said.

The peak season fit perfectly into a cold-weather testing program this past winter. Chrysler Corp. lent 14 vehicles to Doyle's, something Peinovich would love to do again.

"The reason they chose Fargo was because of our temperatures and weather," he said. "Anytime they want to do it, we will take them."

Peinovich also credits a solid and well-documented preventative maintenance program for Chrysler's interest in testing vehicles with Doyle's. The success of last winter's program may open doors for more opportunities in the future, something Peinovich is excited about.

"The future looks favorable," he said.