Ohio GL and Valley GL
Dr. D.B. “Doc” Rushing
© Copyright, 2022, Duncan Bryant Rushing
Preface
The second Ohio Greyhound Lines was a regional operating company of the Greyhound Lines.
Contents
Introduction
Valley Greyhound Lines
Swap with the Lake Shore Coach Company
Second Ohio Greyhound Lines
Penn-Ohio Coach Lines Company
Conclusion
Very Special Articles
Related Articles
Bibliography
Introduction
The Valley Greyhound Lines (VGL) and the second Ohio Greyhound Lines (OhGL) were two small short-time intercity highway-coach carriers and regional operating companies of the Greyhound Lines (GL). The Valley GL existed from 1945 until -49, and the second Ohio GL existed from 1946 until -48. The Greyhound Corporation, the parent umbrella Greyhound firm, merged each of those two small concerns into the main second Central Greyhound Lines (CGL).
Valley Greyhound Lines
In 1945 The Greyhound Corporation — with an uppercase T (because the was an integral part of the official name) — created the Valley GL to buy and take over the Valley Public Service (VPS) Company, which ran in southeastern Ohio in an area bounded by Columbus, Marietta, Pomeroy, Portsmouth, Chillicothe, and Washington Court House (CH).
The VPS Company, based in Columbus, had started in 1928, when it replaced an electric interurban railway between Columbus and Chillicothe. It then grew in part by buying other preexisting bus properties, including these:
the CM&S Transit Company (running between Athens and Marietta),
the Ohio Transit Company (running between Columbus and Pomeroy via Lancaster, Logan, and Athens);
the Central Ohio Transit Company (running between Athens and Lancaster via Rockbridge, Logan, and Nelsonville),
and one route of the Athens Coach Company (the one between Athens and Pomeroy via Shade and Darwin).
By 1945 VPS was a subsidiary of the United Coach Company, which in turn was a subsidiary of the Associated Gas and Electric Company.
In that year, 1945, Greyhound bought the VPS Company, including most of its relatively modern rolling equipment (33 coaches), which consisted of a variety of Twins, Beavers, Yellows, and Flxibles, along with six ACF 29-PBs (which were the largest and most capable cars in the VPS fleet). [Flxible is pronounced as “flexible.”]
Further, the Valley GL acquired three Flxible 29-BRs that PBS had ordered but had not yet received, and the VGL bought 10 more 29-seat Flxibles.
The Valley GL was the smallest regional operating company in the network of the Greyhound Lines.
Swap with the Lake Shore Coach Company
Greyhound and the owner of another carrier, the Lake Shore Coach (LSC) Company, saw an opportunity for a swap, which would work to the advantage of both the Valley GL and the LSC Company.
Harry Arnold, the owner of the LSC Company, had long held and run several motor-coach interests (in both city-transit and intercity segments), which operated mainly in southern Ohio.
However, LSC, based in Sandusky, ran on five routes in northern Ohio:
between Sandusky and Clyde;
between Sandusky and Bucyrus;
between Sandusky and Norwalk via Milan;
between Fremont and Ceylon via Bellevue and Norwalk;
and between Toledo and Cleveland via Fremont and Sandusky.
Arnold was interested in increasing his holdings in southern Ohio (and in eliminating his operation in northern Ohio), and Greyhound was interested in the main LSC route, between Toledo and Cleveland – because LSC held local and intrastate rights along that route, whereas Greyhound did not.
On 20 June 1949 the Valley GL and the LSC Company made an agreement for the two firms to swap their respective assets – the routes, the rights, the coaches, the workforce, and the facilities – with each other.
Promptly, on 21 July 1949, the swap took place.
Almost immediately afterward The Greyhound Corporation, the parent umbrella Greyhound firm, transferred all the newly acquired assets of the Valley GL into the second Central GL, which thus gained the valuable intrastate rights along its mainline route between Toledo and Cleveland (and therefore its mainline route between Chicago and New York City, of which it was a part). The parent firm next dissolved the empty corporate shell of the Valley GL.
Thus ended the Valley GL.
[More about the second Central GL, including the six uses of the name of the Central GL, is available in my article about the Central GL.]
Second Ohio Greyhound Lines
In 1943 The Greyhound Corporation, the parent firm, created the P&O Company – to start buying stock in the Penn-Ohio (PO) Coach Lines (POCL) Company – from the Transportation Securities Corporation (TSC), a holding company, which then owned the PO Coach Lines. [The TSC was in turn a subsidiary of the Commonwealth and Southern (C&S) Corporation.]
[Wendell Lewis Wilkie, a native of Elwood, Indiana, joined the new C&S Corporation in 1929, and he became promoted to its presidency in 1933. He also was the Republican nominee and candidate for the presidency of the US in 1940, against President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who then won the election for his unprecedented third term as the President of the US.]
In 1946 the federal Interstate-commerce Commission (ICC) granted to The Greyhound Corporation the authority to buy all the capital stock outstanding in the POCL Company (and likewise in the Valley Public Service Company, which became the Valley GL).
Greyhound soon created the second Ohio Greyhound Lines (OhGL). It was separate and different from the first Ohio GL, which had previously run during 1935-41, and it likewise was separate and different from the GLI of Ohio, which had previously run during 1927-30. [More about the first Ohio GL and the GLI of Ohio is available in my article about the Great Lakes GL.]
Greyhound transferred its new property, the POCL Company, into its new subsidiary, the second Ohio GL.
[Again: More about the second Central GL, including the six uses of the name of the Central GL, is available in my article about the Central GL.]
Penn-Ohio Coach Lines
The Penn-Ohio Coach Lines Company, based in Youngstown, Ohio, had started in August 1922 as a subsidiary of the Mahoning and Shenango Railway and Electric Company. The objective was to provide a new type of service on two routes:
between Youngstown and Sharon, Pennsylvania, northeast of Youngstown and barely across the state line;
and between Youngstown and Warren via Girard and Niles, all three in Ohio and northwest of Youngstown.
The new coaches (starting with seven White 50s with 18-seat Bender bodies, both built nearby in Cleveland) gave a new level of service that was faster and more comfortable (and thus more desirable) than the experience aboard worn-out railcars running on worn-out tracks.
One major motivation for the management of the owner (the railway-and-electric firm) was to meet and beat (and thus to stave off) the competition from the small independent bus firms operating in that area.
The POCL Company succeeded in establishing and maintaining high standards in their operation, including the appearance and maintenance of the equipment and facilities, the appearance of the drivers’ uniforms (which the company provided), the behavior of the drivers and other workers, and the public relations and customer relations.
By 1926 the POCL had added four new routes:
between Akron and Youngstown (with a loop through Kent and Ravenna);
between Youngstown and New Castle, Pennsylvania, on the way to Pittsburgh);
between Sharon and New Castle;
and between Cleveland and Youngstown via Warren.
The PO Coach Lines continued to grow vigorously.
By 1943, during World War II, the POCL Company had established an impressive route network in northeastern Ohio and into western Pennsylvania and the panhandle of West Virginia. The main routes, in addition to the original routes, consisted of these:
between Akron and Warren via Ravenna;
between Columbus and Youngstown via Canton;
between Cleveland and Pittsburgh via Youngstown;
between Cleveland and Wheeling via East Liverpool;
between Cleveland and Wheeling via Akron;
between Cleveland and Marietta via Akron.
Several of those routes, especially the ones in the northern end of the system, included many alternate parallel loops.
By that year, 1943, the PO Coach Lines had begun to provide significant competition against the Pennsylvania GL, so The Greyhound Corporation sought to buy the POCL and then to operate it as a Greyhound subsidiary.
As I wrote in the first paragraph of the previous section, Greyhound created the P&O Company – to start buying stock in the Penn-Ohio (PO) Coach Lines (POCL) Company – from the Transportation Securities Corporation (TSC), a holding company, which then owned the PO Coach Lines.
Further, as I wrote also in the previous section, in 1946 the federal Interstate-commerce Commission (ICC) granted to Greyhound the authority to buy all the capital stock outstanding in the POCL.
Then Greyhound created the second Ohio Greyhound Lines (OhGL) as a subsidiary, and the Greyhound parent firm (through its P&O Company) bought the POCL Company and placed it into the second Ohio GL.
During 1948 The Greyhound Corporation merged the second Ohio GL into the second Central GL, and it dissolved the empty corporate shell of the OhGL.
Thus ended the second Ohio Greyhound Lines.
[Again: More about the second Central GL, including the six uses of the name of the Central GL, is available in my article about the Central GL.]
Conclusion
The Valley GL and the second Ohio GL made significant contributions to the Greyhound route network.
Very Special Articles
Please check also my very special cornerstone articles at this website:
“Northland Greyhound Lines” (NGL): It tells not only the history of the NGL but also the origin and the early years of the overall Greyhound Lines, starting in 1914 in Hibbing, Minnesota. [The people and the events involved in the early part of the story of the NGL are the same people and events involved also in the origin and the early development of the larger Greyhound empire (including its many divisions and subsidiaries).]
“Greyhound Lines after WW2”: It describes:
the major mergers and consolidations (1948-75);
the changes in leadership at the top;
the move from Chicago to Phoenix (in 1971);
the sales of the Greyhound Lines, Inc. (GLI, in 1987, 1999, 2007, and 2021);
the purchase (in 1987) of the Trailways, Inc. (TWI, previously known as the Continental Trailways) and the merger of the TWI into the GLI;
the sad and regrettable deterioration in the level of service of the formerly great and formerly respected (but now utterly disgraced and discredited) Greyhound Lines;
and the latest development of Greyhound under the ownership of FlixMobility (a German firm) and under the oversight of Flix North America (with a recent Turkish immigrant as the chief executive).
“The Scenicruiser”: It covers the background, conception, evolution, development, design, creation, production, rebuilding, repowering, and operation of the GM PD-4501, the famous, beloved, unmatched, and iconic Scenicruiser (an exclusive coach built for Greyhound alone, which served in the fleet from 1954 until about 1975).
“Growing Up at Greyhound”: It tells about my growing up at Greyhound — as the title says — while my father worked as a longtime (37-year) coach operator for the Greyhound Lines, starting in 1940.
Related Articles
Please see also my articles about the Atlantic Greyhound Lines, the Capitol Greyhound Lines, the Central Greyhound Lines, the Dixie Greyhound Lines, the Florida Greyhound Lines, the Great Lakes Greyhound Lines, the Illinois Greyhound Lines, the New England Greyhound Lines, the Northland Greyhound Lines, the Northwest Greyhound Lines, the Overland Greyhound Lines, the Pacific Greyhound Lines, the Pennsylvania Greyhound Lines, the Pickwick-Greyhound Lines, the Richmond Greyhound Lines, the Southeastern Greyhound Lines, the Southwestern Greyhound Lines, the Teche Greyhound Lines, The Greyhound Corporation, the Greyhound Lines after WW2, the Tennessee Coach Company, and the Scenicruiser.
Bibliography
Jackson, Carlton, Hounds of the Road. Dubuque: Kendall Hunt Publishing Company, 1984. ISBN 0-87972-207-3.
Jon’s Trailways History Corner, an online Trailways history by Jan Hobijn (known also as Jon Hobein) at http://cw42.tripod.com/Jon.html.
Meier, Albert, and John Hoschek, Over the Road. Upper Montclair: Motor Bus Society, 1975. No ISBN (because of the age of book).
Rushing, Duncan Bryant, Wheels, Water, Words, Wings, and Engines. New Albany: Fidelity Publishers, forthcoming.
Schisgall, Oscar, The Greyhound Story. Chicago: J.G. Ferguson Publishing Company, 1985. ISBN 0-385-19690-3.
Motor Coach Age, ISSN 0739-117X, a publication of the Motor Bus Society, various issues, especially these:
April 1973;
December 1978;
September 1979;
October 1979;
July 1984;
October-December 1998;
October-December 1999.
Online schedules and historical data at www.greyhound.com.
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Posted at 23:50 EDT, Wednesday, 15 June 2022.