When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Willett Motor Coach Co Antique Bus Driver Badge Hat Pin. Condition: See photos, surface wear, the yellow enamel paint was possibly repainted at some point.
History of WILLETT MOTOR COACH COMPANY:
This company’s founding goes back into the 1860s when the Willett Company was hauling freight with horse-drawn wagons. Operating out of Chicago, Illinois, Howard Levansellaer Willett, Sr. (1884-1963) was running the company by 1910. A GENERAL CHRONOLOGY OF THE PENNSYLVANIA RAILROAD COMPANY, which was compiled by Christopher T. Baer in 1930, gives some insight about the company: Feb. 19, 1930, American Contract & Trust Company agrees with the Willett Company to incorporate a new “The Willett Company” and transfer to it all its trucking operations and sell 8,000 shares to the AC&T for $400,000; the old company to retain bus operations and be renamed the Willett Motor Coach Company. . . . Mar. 3, 1930. The Willett Company incorporated in Illinois to take over the trucking service of the Willett Company (N.J.); Willett Company (N.J.) retains the bus operations and is renamed Willett Motor Coach Company; the new Willett Company performs pick-up and delivery service for the Pennsylvania Railroad in Chicago, Hammond and Gary, plus station-to-station service in Illinois and Indiana and a general trucking business in Chicago.
By the 1970s the company was owned and operated by Howard Levansellaer Willett, Jr. (1910 – 1974). His 1974 obituary stated he owned the “Willett Motor Coach Company, Willett Trucking Co., Willett Truck Leasing Company Chicago.” By the 1980s the company was contracted to operate school bus service for the Chicago city schools. This 1988 headline gives more information: “School Bus Firm May Sell Business July 12, 1988|By William Gruber. Willett Inc., which provides some bus service to Chicago public schools, has sold its trucking subsidiary to a British company and is negotiating the sale of its school bus and truck leasing businesses, a top company official said Monday.” The badge is made from nickel-plated metal with one threaded post and was made by GREENDUCK CO. CHI. / GREENDUCK CO. CHICAGO.
