{"id":25939,"date":"2020-02-13T19:26:06","date_gmt":"2020-02-14T00:26:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=25939"},"modified":"2020-02-13T19:26:16","modified_gmt":"2020-02-14T00:26:16","slug":"local-school-bus-driver-hangs-up-keys-after-more-than-50-years-of-service","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/local-school-bus-driver-hangs-up-keys-after-more-than-50-years-of-service\/","title":{"rendered":"Local school bus driver hangs up keys after more than 50 years of service"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Percy Fraser is a familiar figure to many children in\nAurora.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 83-year-old has been driving the school bus route for\nthree schools in Town, and is retiring this week. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been driving school buses for over 50 years, in\ndifferent locations. I did it part-time for a while but once I retired as a\nparamedic, I began driving full-time,\u201d said the sprightly senior who believes\nthat age is just a matter of the mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI love driving and I like the kids. The kids keep you\nyoung.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fraser recalls driving school buses in the late 1950s when\nthere were no red lights on top of the bus or the stop sign arm on the driver\u2019s\nside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe used to pull off the road onto the shoulder or a\nparking lot or a gas station, and kids had to walk from there. We would [see]\nkids almost getting hit all the time. It\u2019s much better now in terms of safety,\nbut still not good enough because so many people run through the red lights and\naren\u2019t stopping for the bus,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fraser would start his day at 7.20 a.m. and get a couple\nhours off after finishing the morning run. \u201cI start again at 1.30 p.m. and call\nit a day around 5 p.m., by the time I reach my house in Sutton,\u201d he said,\nadmitting that he is going to be bored now that he is retiring.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy wife passed away, so it\u2019s just my dog and me. I have\n\u2018retired\u2019 five times already but could only stay off for three months each\ntime,\u201d he said, laughing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He hopes to still occasionally drive seniors around and\nalso go to Alberta to visit his daughter and spend time with his great\ngrandchildren. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Having driven generations of kids around Ontario, Fraser enjoys\ntheir company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou do get the odd rambunctious kid, but usually most of\nthem are well-behaved. You have to treat them the way you want to be treated,\u201d\nhe said, recommending bus driving especially to mothers who are home with their\nchildren. \u201cBus companies are always looking for good drivers. You can make\nanywhere from $300-$400 a week and you only work for a couple hours in the\nmorning and afternoons. More people should be trying to get in, and it\u2019s ideal\nfor mothers because they can bring their children on the bus.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The father of four wouldn\u2019t retire if it weren\u2019t for his ageing body. \u201cMy mind is still young but my body is getting old. My eyesight and hearing isn\u2019t as good as it used to be. You\u2019re holding a precious cargo when you drive a school bus and it\u2019s not a place to be taking chances with.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Kinjal Dagli Shah <\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Percy Fraser is a familiar figure to many children in Aurora. The 83-year-old has been driving the school bus route for three schools in Town, and is retiring this week. \u201cI\u2019ve been driving school buses for over 50 years, in different locations. I did it part-time for a while but once I retired as a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":25929,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/2020-02-13-05.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-6Kn","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-01 11:18:08","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}