Thread: Need help on bus origins.

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Recently we bought a '53 Ford School Bus in Texas and shipped it to New Zealand.
It's going on to a 2000 Chev lwb duallie chassis with 454 and will become our mobile caravan cum hot-rod.
The other day we pulled the interior lining and studied all the graffiti pencilled up on the ceiling, hoping it would give us some clue as to the origins/previous life of the bus.
This is what we found:

"Vannessa"
"Marilyn Sue Dirkee Soph '55 '56"
"Beverly Mason '55 '56 2nd grade"
"Adele"
"Billings Oklahoma Henry Hamlon '55 '56 age 16"...he's a good boy; he enabled us to work out what was painted on the outside of the bus.
"Loretta xxx Alf"
"Regina + Tommy"
"Gary Goodhart"
"Sharron Wright"
"Karen Dirkee"
"Marlene + Levearn"
"Veronica Grnavey"
"Gary Dirkee 10th grade 9-4-56"
"Billy Craig"
"Ted Riddle"
"Bruce Dirkee"
"Paully"
"Sid Mason '54 '55"
"Amy Durl"
"George Powley"
"William Penn"
"Don Raulum"
"Caroline Wiler"
"William Pearl"
"Dominic Schultz"
(Some of these names might be spelt wrong...they were hard to decipher...fifty years is a long time for a pencilled message to survive.)

And because of what the then young Henry Hamlon had written; on the outside it would have originally said:
"Billings Ind Dist No 4"
We think.
Because painted above that we could make out: "Canada"; and that's a fair step from Billings Oklahoma.
All we could make out of "Billings" before had been: "???NLUNGS Ind Dist No 4"
Well, that's what we all thought it said.
Sigh.

I'd like to photograph the graffiti, transfer it to vinyl and replace it (slightly enhanced,) once the bus is finished.
It's a part of the bus surely; and should be retained.
I'd like to know more about the bus; where it was based, who drove it, what route it ran, and more about the (then) kids that rode in it.
They'd be seventy year olds now!

Can anybody shed any light?

I looked the school up and they have a web site. You may get some excitement going and a lot of support getting done what you want to do.

Thanks sfort.
Do you know which school you Googled?
I've tried that and got a bewildering array of schools to pick from.
I've e-mailed a few I thought might be "The One" but have yet to hear back from them.

You might want to try here and maybe they can give you some more leads.
http://www.billings.k12.ok.us/administration/admin.htm

This is one of the most recent.http://www.billingsschools.org/

I like that one better also !

Hey Johnboy, I live in Texas and I have unlimited long distance phone calling so if you would like for me to make a call for you and ask you particular questions, then I would be happy to. Just PM me with a list of things you would like to know and I will try to find them out for you. Sometimes calling is much better than emailing IMHO.

Just let me know if I can help - - OK?

Check FaceBook to see if the school or even the class may have a page.
About 6 months ago I started one for the small Catholic Grade School I attended back in the 60's & have had about 240 people join it already. Plus you'd be surprised how many schools have them. I have seen lotsssss....joe

I spent pretty well all day yesterday on the computer, surfing the net, Facebook, anything I could think of, (wandered out for tea at 6 o'clock and She Who Must Be Obeyed said "What have you been doing all day?"
"Well...nothing really..." and got the 'raised eyebrows' look,) and I think I may have cracked it.

I found this site: http://billingsok.swiftsite.com/ and wrote to them asking if they could help.

And...(drum roll please,) got this reply: 'Several of the names you have are cousins of mine .Still some of them live in Billings ,Oklahoma, Such as Karen Durkee. Marilyn Durkee lives in my town, Perry, Oklahoma. That was a great group of children. hope the ones riding it now are as good. Shirley Holt Self'

So I have written back asking if she would be so kind as to send me some contact details for these people.

Fingers crossed!

Wow, Johnboy, I've made 2 phone calls and you've gotten more info than I could from "down under" - - - - way to go - - - perserverence (sp) is a great tool ! Did she give you any clue what the word Canada had reference to??


My Wiffy asked me what I did and I told her nothing and she said that was what I did yesterday and I told her "Yeah, I wasn't through!"

Originally Posted by MelloYello

Wow, Johnboy, I've made 2 phone calls and you've gotten more info than I could from "down under" - - - - way to go - - - perserverence (sp) is a great tool ! Did she give you any clue what the word Canada had reference to??

Hey, I tell ya Emmett I'm as happy as a dog with two tails and a hundred lamp-posts!

All she told me was what was in the post above; essentially that some of these 'kids' were still around, were cousins of hers, and she knew where they lived.

I just hope that a) she realises that this is important to me, and b) that some of those 'kids' still extant will agree to being contacted by me.

I'll give it a couple of days (jigging up and down with suppressed excitement and impatience) and if she hasn't responded I'll contact her again.

Did the link to the photos of the bus work?
I'll post it again so's others can look if they wish to. It's about the 8th post down...there's some more on the next couple of pages too.
(And one of me sitting behind the wheel and just about caught making 'brrmm brrmm' noises.)

http://www.hotrodrevue.co.nz/forum/v....php?f=10&t=81

All it took was that one lucky hit and the whole world opened up. I hope you get some neat information that will help in the style of build you are doing. NZ is not as far away as you think! Keep us posted.

I thought that perhaps, the mention of Canada might have referred to the Blue Bird Corp. which made many similar school buses, but when I checked they did not open a Canadian plant until 1958 (in Brantford Ont.) Since the bus is a 1953, that would not apply.
Just so everyone knows what Johnboy is referring to, I have taken the liberty of copying the photos from the link he referred to.
It sounds like a great project and I would imagine the "kids" will be thrilled to hear about it.

Actually Bob the trim on the nose is 51. In 52 the trim piece was not chrome and the V8 emblem was located on the hood (there is a picture of a 52 in my album). Of course over the years who knows what parts have been replaced

I can't rememeber what I had for breakfast (or EVEN if I had breakfast) but I can remember this )

Originally Posted by Mike P

Actually Bob the trim on the nose is 51. In 52 the trim piece was not chrome and the V8 emblem was located on the hood (there is a picture of a 52 in my album). Of course over the years who knows what parts have been replaced

I can't rememeber what I had for breakfast (or EVEN if I had breakfast) but I can remember this )

You're quite right.
As soon as I read what you had posted the wheels went round...ummm...yeah...right.
Could it have been registered in Oklahoma in '53?
Could the year between '51 and '53 explain the 'Canada' painted on the side?

a little bit of effort will get you here