QOCS now owns the historic bus that has travelled around over recent decades
One of Queensland’s oldest buses has returned home to the Garden City for the first time in more than two decades.
The rare 1938 Bedford bus, now on display inside Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport, operated passenger services in Toowoomba for 40 years.
The bus is now owned by the Queensland Omnibus and Coach Society (QOCS), a not-for-profit organisation dedicated to preserving Queensland’s passenger transport heritage.
QOCS purchased the vehicle in November last year after it was put up for auction by Greyhound Australia.
Its acquisition was made possible by a consortium of bus industry colleagues and members and friends of the McCafferty family, who generously donated $45,000 to QOCS.
“We are very pleased to have the bus return home to Toowoomba for the first time since 2001”, QOCS President Nick Wilson says.
“Having one of our vehicles on display inside an airport is a first for our organisation, and we are very grateful to the Wagners and the team at Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport for making it happen.”
A formal unveil of the vehicle with the McCafferty family will take place in early September.
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The bus’s story begins in England during 1938 when the chassis was exported to Australia, making it one of the few WTB model Bedfords that arrived in Australia prior to World War II.
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Pictured on 14 September 1972 at Alderley Street and Cathro Park in Toowoomba under the sole ownership of Wally Cousins.
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The vehicle’s bodywork was completed by Waddingtons (later renamed Commonwealth Engineering) at Granville in western Sydney on 5 April 1939, as its body frame construction is all-steel, which is rare at the time as most builders in Australia were still using wood for framing.
The bus was sold new to Toowoomba bus proprietor James Frain, who operated a service between the City and South and Alderley Streets.
The bus spent most of its life under the joint ownership of George Wingett, Bill Mitchell and Wally Cousins, trading as Hume Street Bus Service, and then under the sole ownership of Wally Cousins, before it passed down a generation to Graham Cousins.
The bus was retired from service in April 1979 and was sold for preservation to Sunshine Coast Coaches owner Alastair Grant.
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Jack and Lorna McCafferty pictured with the Bedford bus outside their home in Turnbull Street, Toowoomba after the bus was refurbished by Coachworks for Jack McCafferty’s 82nd birthday in 1996.
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After Alastair Grant sadly passed away, the bus was purchased by Tony McCafferty of McCafferty’s Coaches, repainted into McCafferty’s original colours, and gifted to his father and company founder Jack McCafferty on his 82nd birthday in March 1996.