A kid hack was a horse-drawn vehicle used for transporting children to school in the late 19th and early 20th century in the United States. The word hack, meaning a horse-drawn cab, is short for hackney carriage. The vehicle was actually powered by both horses and mules, and usually loaded at the rear to avoid frightening the animals. In those days, most elementary children in rural areas attended one-room schools. A typical kid hack would serve all the farms in the area of the school, and usually transport under 20 children.
The horse-drawn kid hack is considered to be the precursor to the modern yellow school bus. As early as 1914, versions of kid hacks were attached to early motor vehicles by the Wayne Works in Richmond, Indiana. As motorized trucks became more commonplace in rural locations, detachable wooden kid hack bodies were made which could be removed when the truck was in other use. Around 1927, much heavier all-steel bodies were introduced for this purpose by Wayne Works and other companies. Permanently mounted on the truck chassis, the combined vehicle became known as a school bus.
The Wayne County Historical Museum in Richmond, Indiana has a restored horse-drawn "kid hack" on display.
Famous quotes containing the words kid and/or hack:
“Spooky things happen in houses densely occupied by adolescent boys. When I checked out a four-inch dent in the living room ceiling one afternoon, even the kid still holding the baseball bat looked genuinely baffled about how he possibly could have done it.”
—Mary Kay Blakely (20th century)
“Painting consumes labour not disproportionate to its effect; but a fellow will hack half a year at a block of marble to make something in stone that hardly resembles a man. The value of statuary is owing to its difficulty. You would not value the finest head cut upon a carrot.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)