Blog No 2 Bus Travel
When I first became friends with non-Amish people while working at St. Anthony Hospital in Oklahoma City, I learned that most people detested travel by bus and avoided it at all costs. As an Amish boy, traveling by bus was exciting, we were introduced to big cities such St. Louis and Indianapolis, and we saw wondrous sights never seen before. Since the Amish do not have cars, travel by bus was our primary mode of transportation for any destination beyond the range of horse and buggy. In the 1950s and 1960s there were two major bus lines, Continental Trailways and Greyhound, and although bus travel was more common, the automobile reigned as king during that time.
US Highway 65 passed within 3 miles of our home and this was where we caught the Trailway bus to our nearest town of Harrison to buy paperback books, or embarked on a transcontinental trip to visit Freundschaft in Indiana or Ontario, Canada. Long-distance journeys often involved overnight travel during which we relaxed in a comfortable seat and were lulled to sleep by the purring of the diesel engines. Only Trailway buses plied the US 65 route, and we became attached to this bus line, as fans get attached to a local sports team. During a 74-day bus trip in 1964 and 1965 that Alvin and I made to Pennsylvania and Ontario, we became acquainted with the “five-star luxury service” of Trailway’s flagship bus, the Golden Eagle. An uniformed attendant traveled on the bus with us, serving us drinks and meals, and more than qualified as luxury service in our minds. The earliest photograph of me in existence was taken by me at a coin-operated photo booth in a bus station in St Louis, when I combed my hair, and tried to look my best.
Some legs of our trip were only served by Greyhound bus and we were introduced to Greyhound’s Scenicruiser, the grandest bus of its time. It was a split-level double decker bus with 43 passenger seats, the upper level provided a 360-degree scenic view, and was equipped with a lavatory, but we still preferred Trailway. In retrospect, I thought we had not given Greyhound proper credit, until I recently learned that most passengers considered Trailway buses quieter, more comfortable, and they were known to have fewer mechanical issues than the Scenicruiser.
Some years later, during my residency in neurosurgery in Portland, Oregon, my wife Michele and I visited my parents in Belize, where they moved in 1966. Life as a resident was hardly luxurious, so we flew to Mexico City, but to conserve funds, we traveled on a direct bus through the Yucatan peninsula to Chetumal, a decidedly underdeveloped town on the border of Belize. By this time bus travel had lost much of its glamour.
