Tennessee Coach Company - Sale of TCC

Sale of TCC

In 1960 the Tennessee Coach Company became sold to a new firm (created specifically to buy the TCC), named as the Tennessee Trailways, Inc., owned in three equal shares by three other Trailways member companies. The investors were the Virginia Stage Lines (the Virginia Trailways), the Smoky Mountain Lines (the Smoky Mountain Trailways), and the Continental Tennessee Lines (a Trailways concern which ran in part between Nashville and Knoxville along US-70N via Lebanon, Carthage, Cookeville, and Crossville. The TCC retained its old brand name until 1976 despite the sale.

In 1966 the Transcontinental Bus System (operating as the Continental Trailways), based in Dallas, Texas, bought most of the large Trailways member companies along the Atlantic Seaboard. Those included were the Safeway Trails (the Safeway Trailways), the Virginia Stage Lines (the Virginia Trailways), the Queen City Coach Company (the Queen City Trailways), and the Smoky Mountain Stages (the Smoky Mountain Trailways), but not the Carolina Coach Company (the Carolina Trailways) or the Tamiami Trail Tours (the Tamiami Trailways).

Thus the Transcontinental Bus System (the Continental Trailways) acquired the other two-thirds of the ownership of the Tennessee Trailways (which had bought the Tennessee Coach Company in 1960) – through its purchase of the Virginia Trailways and the Smoky Mountain Trailways – in addition to the one-third share which already was the property of the Continental Tennessee Lines, already a subsidiary of the Continental Southern Lines, which in turn was a division of the Transcontinental Bus System (the Continental Trailways).