Primitive Transportation

Tommy Towery

LHS '64

I couldn’t decide what to feature this week as a story to which some of you might be able to relate. The idea of how we moved about before we had cars came to me. Personally, my first method of transportation, which I remember, was riding the bus. That happened when my family moved from Halsey Avenue to Huntsville Park when I was in the first grade at Rison. It was late in the school year, and rather than transferring to a new school so late in the term, my parents decided it would be better for me to just ride the bus to school for those last few weeks or months. I was six years old. So, each school morning I would catch the bus in Huntsville Part and ride it to Rison. When school was out each day I would once again hop on a bus and ride it back to Huntsville Park. Many (or most) days I would fall asleep on the trip home and the bus driver knew where I was going so he would wake me up to get off at the right stop.

The next year we moved to East Clinton Street and riding to school was no longer needed. I was only one block from East Clinton Elementary School, so I walked every day. There was a bus route that came down East Clinton so riding the bus was still in my options. I was only two blocks from downtown, so I walked there whenever I went there. The bus was my transportation to West Huntsville where my grandmother was a cook at the Rebel Inn. That café was just across the street from the Center Theater, which was a cheap form of entertainment; so many times I rode the bus to go to the movie there.

Back then it only cost a dime to ride. There was a meter at the front of the bus where you got on and you just dropped your dime in the meter and sat down. At that time the front of the buses was reserved for white people and the back was where the black people could sit. Most of us lived through the transition of that practice.

My next encounter with buses was when I moved to McCullough Avenue and started to school at Lee Junior High. City buses were used to provide transportation to school children and each school morning I would once again hop on the school bus and ride it to Lee. It had already picked up kids from other places, but there always seemed to still be seating available. I only used that service for the year I was in the ninth grade, because before I started the tenth grade we moved to Lincoln Village and away from a bus route to get me to school.

I now ask some of you to share some of your own memories about riding the bus in Huntsville. Do you have any unique events that you still remember today? Did any of you date using the bus as transportation to someplace?  Please take this opportunity to share some of them.

The Wayback Machine

"Bus Stop" is a song recorded and released as a single by the British rock band the Hollies in 1966. It reached No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart. It was the Hollies' first US top ten hit, reaching No. 5 on the Billboard charts in September 1966. In Canada, the song reached No. 1 and was their second top ten hit there. With the release of "Bus Stop" as a single in June 1966, the Hollies joined the trend known as raga rock, a subgenre first popularised by the Beatles, the Byrds and the Kinks.

I hope all of you who can go will have a great time at the Lee Lunch Bunch get together. Unfortunately I am still not in a good traveling condition for the trip this time. I am getting better, but it is taking a little longer than I had hoped.

Thanks Delores for your weekly response to my emails.

I hope some of you will help me out by sharing some of your own experiences with the buses in Huntsville. It would be nice to hear some other classmate's story.

SAVE THE DATE

Lee Lunch Bunch

Classes of ’64, ’65, ‘66

Date: Thursday, October 24, 2024

Time: 11:00 AM

Place: Logan’s Roadhouse

Balmoral Dr.

Huntsville, AL

Reservations Required through the following:

Patsy Oldroyd ‘65

C (256) 431-3396

H (256) 232-7583

keithandpatsy@att.net

Getting this together this time was more difficult than ever before. Logan’s now requires groups to go through a reservation agency. Also, I had to do some tall talking to avoid the expensive reservation fee they now require along with a contract. Our history of the past fourteen years there for our LLB is the only thing that saved me this time from all of that. I was lucky to only have to do the reservation agency. So… PLEASE do let me know if you plan to come, and do show up! Sorry no last-minute show-ups without a reservation. Thanks! 

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