06/12/2026
PART 2 of 3: Life on the Bus — The “Bone Shakers”
In 1928 buses replaced most trolley cars in our area, but were they really an upgrade? Called “bone shakers,” they were LOUD and persnickety hunks of metal, lacking the comforts of buses of today.
Longtime Chathamite Albert Edward Pike, who drove buses in town for more than two decades beginning around 1950, described how the technology changed drastically over time.
Why “bone shakers”? The earliest buses were heavy, steel machines built to last—and comfort was not the priority. Pike calls them “big and quite clumsy,” and describes metal-on-metal brakes screeching loudly every time they were engaged. “Many times, when drivers had to make a sudden stop, the shoes would actually weld to the brake drum.”
Drivers bundled up against winter weather in overcoats, mufflers, and ear muffs, “anything at all to try to keep warm.”
And forget about icy streets! “Down hill on ice you forgot all about the two-wheel brakes, down-shifted into a lower gear, and hoped for the best,” Pike said. He had his bus turn completely around “not once, but three times. We have a saying: ‘Get the front end through and the back end will take care of it self.’” Yikes!!
It’s easy to romanticize the past, until you imagine bouncing down Main Street in a “bone shaker” and praying your driver had things under control ; )
Next up: traffic—and Pike’s very candid advice for motorists.
Source: Albert Edward Pike, Fishawack Papers, Vol. 3 (pp. 389–394)
📷 1920s bus at Jersey City’s Exhange Place, photo provenance unkown.
