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Fifth Avenue Coach Company collection

Call Number

PR 18

Date

1895-1962, inclusive

Creator

Fifth Avenue Coach Company

Extent

6.67 Linear feet (473 mounted photographs, 309 unmounted prints of various sizes including cyanotypes, and 3 albums of photos, clippings and ephemera)

Language of Materials

This collection is primarily visual. Any text is likely to be in English.

Abstract

The Fifth Avenue Coach Collection of photographs dates from 1895 through 1962. The photos document the company's buses, bus operations, bus construction, bus repair and maintenance, bus stops and routes, and facilities. Views include work areas, as well as leisure areas for employees, and special events such as public service projects. Photos also show street scenes of the city. The albums contain clippings and other items documenting the company and its public relations.

Historical Note

The Fifth Avenue Coach Company, incorporated in 1896, was a horse-drawn omnibus line originally founded in 1885 as the Fifth Avenue Transportation Company (Ltd.) to discourage the laying of trolley tracks on the fashionable two-way thoroughfare. Battery operated vehicles were quickly abandoned after their introduction in 1900 as a result of their expense and inefficiency. Horse-drawn London-type omnibuses continued to be used until 1907, when they were replaced by gasoline-driven motor coaches with French engines and London chassis. The company began producing their own motor coaches in 1914 and became well known for their double-decker models.

The Fifth Avenue Coach Company became a subsidiary of the Third Avenue Railway Company in 1898 and the New York Transportation Company in 1899, gaining its independence in 1912. In 1924 it became a subsidiary of the Omnibus Corporation, which controlled the bus systems in New York and Chicago. In 1954, after acquiring the Hertz car rental business, the Omnibus Corporation sold the assets of the Fifth Avenue Coach Company to the New York City Omnibus Corporation, which was renamed Fifth Avenue Coach Lines in 1956. After a strike in 1962, the company's bus operations were taken over by the city.

Arrangement

This collection is organized in ten series:

Series I: Buses and Automotive Parts
Series II: Employee Photographs
Series III: Company Facilities
Series IV: Street Scenes
Series V: Instructional Images
Series VI: War Relief Effort
Series VII: Diagrams and Charts
Series VIII: Publicity Mock-ups
Series IX: Loose Photographs
Series X: Albums and Scrapbooks

Scope and Contents

The Fifth Avenue Coach Company Collection documents the Manhattan company's buses, facilities, operations, and employees. Though the collection spans the years of the company's existence (1896-1954), most of the 473 mounted photographs date from 1915 through 1928. The photographs were commissioned by the company for advertising and public relations purposes, as well as for use in employee training. The mounted photographs were originally numbered consecutively and arranged in numerical order, with numerous gaps in the sequence.

Access Restrictions

Materials in this collection may be stored offsite. For more information on making arrangements to consult them, please visit www.nyhistory.org/library/visit.

Use Restrictions

Taking images of documents from the library collections for reference purposes by using hand-held cameras and in accordance with the library's photography guidelines is encouraged. As an alternative, patrons may request up to 20 images per day from staff.

Application to use images from this collection for publication should be made in writing to: Department of Rights and Reproductions, The New-York Historical Society, 170 Central Park West, New York, NY 10024-5194, rightsandrepro@nyhistory.org. Phone: (212) 873-3400 ext. 282.

Copyrights and other proprietary rights may subsist in individuals and entities other than the New-York Historical Society, in which case the patron is responsible for securing permission from those parties. For fuller information about rights and reproductions from N-YHS visit: https://www.nyhistory.org/about/rights-reproductions

Preferred Citation

This collection should be cited as Fifth Avenue Coach Company Collection

Location of Materials

Materials in this collection may be stored offsite. For more information on making arrangements to consult them, please visit www.nyhistory.org/library/visit.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Gift from the Metropolitan Transit Authority in 1981.

Related Materials

Also housed in the Department of Prints, Photographs, and Architectural Collections, the Subway Construction Photograph Collection and the Norvin H. Green Collection of Elevated Railways document alternative modes of public transportation in New York City in the first decades of the 20th century.

Collection processed by

Lauren Gilbert

About this Guide

This finding aid was produced using ArchivesSpace on 2023-08-21 15:48:20 -0400.
Language: Description is in English.

Edition of this Guide

This version was derived from[fifthave01ES.xml]

Repository

New-York Historical Society
New-York Historical Society
170 Central Park West
New York, NY 10024