- Seller: Hope C
- Location: LaMoure, North Dakota
- Mileage: 188,280 Shown
- Chassis #: 98RT-143695
- Title Status: Missing
- Engine: 239cui Flathead V8
In Shakespeare’s comedy As You Like It (hear me out), a character named Jaques performs a famous monologue about the seven “acts” of a man’s life, one of them being “a whining schoolboy…creeping like snail unwillingly to school.” Maybe times haven’t changed that much in 400 years, but students in Elizabethan England didn’t have midcentury school buses to deliver them to their lessons on the “three r’s” either. When I was a kid, one of the best parts of my school day was indeed the ride itself: the sounds and smells of the various yellow and black buses I would sometimes hitch a ride on when my parents couldn’t drop me off at the door. But I didn’t get to ride in this: a 1949 Ford F-5 school bus. Found on a North Dakota farmstead, this bus has long ago been converted into a camper, but there’s no telling what you could do with it now, and it’s being offered as a no reserve Barn Finds Auction.
Some things have changed since this bus was built (OK, a lot of things), and one of them is the bus itself. I imagine it took a little more muscle and coordination to herd this F-5 while you were busy keeping a lid on things in the back. With a four-speed sliding gear transmission (which had a 6.40:1 first, good to probably five miles per hour), the driver got to practice their double-clutching skills every time they shifted. See, it’s not just school where you can get an education! There’s no power steering, no air brakes, just you and the bus (and up to 24 kids in the back, according to the build plate.)
There are dozens of (frankly artistic) photographs of the bus posted below, but I had to point out this one specifically: “Horses are cool.” Now I’m invested; is this half-hearted graffiti artist being serious? Ironic? You can see that most of the seats themselves are missing (because of the camper conversion), so it’s a blank canvas in here.
The F-5 could have either the flathead six or the famous 239-cubic-inch flathead V8 pictured here, producing 100 gross horsepower and 90 net horsepower. I’ve mentioned this before, but manufacturers would typically provide both ratings to potential buyers, as a vehicle’s actual abilities were far more important than marketing hyperbole. The F-5 was offered in three wheelbase lengths: 134, 158, and 194 inches. This one is almost certainly the 134-inch version with a 24-passenger capacity and a 12,000-pound GVW rating.
The pictures clearly show that this is a project bus that’s been sitting for a long time, but it’s surprisingly solid; I’ll say it’s in better shape than it looks. There is some rust around the roof where it meets the windows, and a little rust around the wheels, but if you’re buying this bus, you are accustomed to sheet metal fabrication and welding (or know someone who is).
Yes, this is going to be a big project, but the possibilities are endless. You could restore it to stock to relive those days when you unwillingly crept off to school, or you could update it with a modern driveline and chassis and take the entire block along wherever you might decide to go. Old school buses are cool, and if you have the means and the skill to put this F-5 back on the road, bid now!
Bid On This Auction
Jordan bid $3,300.00 2025-04-05 19:51:40
Way cool! Endless possibilities! What about the JD A in the background?
The tractor isn’t for sale. Its engine is slated for a rebuild of another one.
I think that there is an old patchouli oil scented air freshener in the glovebox…
Looks like one of the damn Hippie buses I used to see on my way to church )
Say what you want about those hippies, but I bet they got a lot more then you or I did.
At least they had something to show for their money. And had fun too.
At least they had something to show for their money. And had fun too!
The perfect project, for someone who wants to touch and restore every inch of this bad boy.
I also generally enjoyed my 3 1/2 years of riding the bus. I liked the adventuresome trucky-ness of the experience.
A few thoughts:
It would have been a job just to drive this old Ford, without even considering keeping the “passengers” under control.
If this is indeed the 134 inch wheelbase, my F150 SuperCrew’s wheelbase is 9 inches longer. Amazing when you think about it.
This morning while walking the dog, a local school bus was making its stops in the subdivision. It was the regular set-back-axle model common today (I don’t know the manufacturer), and looked like it was about 235 feet long. Something like this old bus surely would been easier to navigate around a neighborhood.
I remember riding scholl busses as a kid in the early 60’s. No Fords like this though. The first ones I remember were early 50’s Reo’s, and then mid 60’s GMC’s. I always wondered did these have a bigger master cylinder than cars at the time? Hopefully not the same single pot that cars used. When I was in 7th grade one of the GMC’s lost it’s brakes going down a pretty steep hill. The driver ditched in a field, luckily nobody was hurt.
I’ve seen restored school busses at the Hershey fall car show. Some from as far away as California. You just have to be awe of time, work and money it takes to restore on of these. It has to be a labor of love, I don’t think it would be profitable for sure. And this one needs everything. It would probably cost more to get it home than it is worth. Good luck to the seller and future buyer, they have their work cut out for them.
Would make an awesome series on YouTube converting this into a camper using a modern truck chassis.
Hail to the bus driver, bus driver man, he screams and he cusses and rams other buses,,,or Veronica Crabtree, “Sit down and shut up or Mr. bunny rabbit gets it”,( pointing gun at rabbits head),so many stories about buses and their drivers. I never got in on that, as I had to walk uphill in blizzards, both ways to school, and bus rides were only for field trips. They usually wreaked of vomit, and remember the crunching of gears wondering if that was normal? Man, sure a lot of pictures, would have cost a bundle at Walgreens years ago. As is, I see little use for it, as said, it needs to be on a modern chassis as a camper but I don’t know if anyone does this anymore. Not when Camping World offers $399/month ready to go. Maybe a jet engine dragster?
You forgot, that walk was often walking backwards, barefoot, many times over broken glass. And, we didn’t dare complain. We were tougher than kids today, obviously. Us walkers were the coolest kids, though the bus riders thought they were. Many times I remember on a bitterly cold very subzero windy days, seeing the supposedly cool kids getting off a bus that had went in a ditch or was stranded for some time. They would be wearing only a letterman jacket or something like that while we were in long johns, multiple layers, rubber boots, scarfs, parkas so thick we were as wide as we were tall. Usually they laughed at us, but on some of those mornings seeing the shivering pain on the faces of the pitifully unprepared, all one could do was chuckle.
A family laugh: I have a cousin that was entering 2nd grade in the fall of `52. His Mom (my aunt) took a photo of him getting on a Ford ‘shorty’ bus just like this (`48-`49?) on his first day of second grade. He wasn’t very happy to see summer break come to a close and frowned in the photo lol! He showed me the pic at a family reunion one year–got a good laugh!
Reminds me of the Call Of The Wild movie in Alaska. I think that one was yellow.
Perhaps “Return to the Wild”…and he died on that bus, frozen to death.
I rode school busses from age 5 to 17, kindergarten to 12th grade. From early 50’s Chevrolets to 60’s IHs, all of which carried at least 40-60, no seat belts, all 4 speed manuals with a hi-lo button, some later ones with air brakes, no high-back seats, rear emergency door. The early ones were leases from the local bus company, but the later ones were yellow. Some had a flip out sign to stop and the later ones had flashing lights. Every day to and from all of the different schools….no such thing as a ‘neighborhood’ school when you lived in what was then rural New York and is now deep suburbia.
into the wild krakauer
guy stared to death
Into the wild, I was thinking the same thing great movie and book!
Can’t you just hear the ch-ch-ch- of those air brakes? And the “girls welcome” sign?
I can still hear the 345 V8 with a 5 speed trans on the early 70’s IH 1600 Loadstar bus.
My parents and I lived out in the country in rural Ohio and during the winter the bus driver would have to stop periodically to reposition the tire chains before going up a huge, steep hill called Chicken Coup hill. That bus would power up that hill in the snow like it was nothing.
If I may ask, where in Ohio?
Replying to Bob
Near a small town called SugarGrove in the Hocking Hills area.
Reply to Scott
Based on the geography/road name reference, I thought so. I grew up in the neighboring small town Bremen. For those who have no clue what we are talking about, our growing-up homes were less than ten miles apart in rural Ohio. Small world I guess.
Great Morel hunting down by Bremen! My Aunt and Uncle lived close to Bremen on County line road.
It is a small world!
Lancaster in the early 70’s. Very closed minded at the time. If you weren’t born there, they would treat you as an outsider no matter how long you lived there. Tell friends that’s probably why Sherman burned down the South.
Except this one doesn’t have air brakes, nor power steering. I believe when it was leading its intended life, it served a farming community where the houses were few and far apart.
I bought a bus just like this at a farm auction for a few dollars. Then decided it wasn’t worth hauling home. Took a few cool lights and parts off of it and left it there. Might still be there, out in the middle of Montana.
In 1967, two years after my wife and I got married, we joined a medium sized church in Decatur, Ga. The church had a 1951 Ford bus like this, but in better shape. I didn’t run but looked good with nice white paint job and the church name painted on the sides. I casually asked about it but was told that a member’s friend of a friend was going to fix it. I was putting Chevy 307 engine with a T400 in a 47 Ford pickup at that time and as a relatively new member I decided to stay out of it. I wanted to put a better engine with an automatic transmission in it. I never heard it run and later on it was gone so that ended that. I never heard what happened to it.
Speaking of buses we rode as kids, our school district had Gillig transit-style buses with the engine in the back. I remember those well because they had Detroit “Screamin’ Jimmy” diesels in them that you could hear a mile away from the bus stop!
When I was in grade school I used to ride to school in an old Brockway bus probably from the late 40’s possibly early 50’s it was probably 20 years old but they always maintained the buses really well.
We had an older retired woman for a bus driver and she shifted and handled that old bus like a pro despite it not having power steering.
I posted previously about riding the school bus in rural Ohio in the early 70’s. We had a female bus driver (Mrs Powers) who was awarded the safest bus driver in the state in the early 70’s. If I remember correctly, she got the award more than once.
Is that a Wayne bus body or a Thomas? I know it’s not Superior, Bluebird, or Carpenter.
It’s a Steelcraft, according to the data tag.
Add flower decals…instant Partridge Family Bus.
Sugar Grove, Ohio, sounds a bit “familiar”. I lived in New Albany in the 1950s, back when it was the coss-roads of Routes #161 and #62, and had a population of about 270. I didn’t live in town; I lived about 1-1/2 miles east on a farm along route #161, what we called The Granville Road. We went to Buckeye Lake a number of times, and we’re out near Lancaster and Zanesville. And I certainly remember the Hocking Hills. As others here have said, small world.
The ” Into the Wild” bus was an IHC K model. The Alaska National Guard eventually had to fly it out with ah helicopter because it was a tourist nuisance resulting in the death of 2 hikers .
“On June 18, 2020, Chris McCandless’ famous bus shelter was airlifted by the Army National Guard from its location to an undisclosed temporary storage site to stop hikers from endangering themselves trying to reach it. ”
Make a cool tiny house out of this Ford.