Truck Tales, Part One

The 'Free City Bus Service'

originally published December 20, 2006

Back in May of last year, I decided to try my hand at long-distance truck driving. My job as an adjunct college instructor left me unemployed during the summer, and under-employed the rest of the year. I needed more income and it seemed the trucking industry was always looking for drivers.

Truck driving wasn’t just a flip-of-the-coin choice. Back when I was in my 20s, before the days of the Commercial Driver’s License (CDL), I had driven a truck for an air freight forwarding company; shuttling cargo between customers and the major airports around New York City.

My “territory” was northern New Jersey, and the freight came to or went out from Newark, Kennedy and La Guardia and occasionally Philadelphia Airports.

Learning to guide the 26-foot truck through the narrow traffic-clogged streets of Newark, Patterson and Jersey City, as well all the boroughs of New York City, was a skill that didn’t come easily, but stayed with me.

A few years later, after I moved to Georgia, I got a freelance job driving empty rental trucks from all over the Southeast back to the metro New York area. Rather than having the trucks sit in a Southern rental lot and gather dust, the company paid to have them driven back to the bustling Northeast where they were in high demand.

As a “contractor,” I was paid 10 cents a mile and reimbursed for fuel. When I dropped the trucks off, I was also given the cost of a plane ticket back to Atlanta. If I really pushed it, I could make two trips a week. Drivers were given phony “rental contracts” and were told to never travel in groups. I suspect the whole endeavor was illegal and violated the road use tax laws of every state I drove through.

After several trips, I formed what writer Evan "Rick" Baker called the “Free-City Bus Service.” The premise was simple: if I saw a hitchhiker or even a group of hitchhikers, I would pick them up. This was the mid-'70s, so there was never a shortage of “passengers.” The only condition I had was they rode in back in the cargo box.

On one particular run, Evan had come with me and at various places on the way I had stopped to pick folks up. By 3 a.m., we were on the southern end of the New Jersey Turnpike with a hippie couple, two GIs, a wandering musician and two winos heading to New York City.

It was just then that an eager state trooper, obviously lured by the sight of two hippies in a large rental truck cruising through the Jersey night, decided to pull me over and check things out. They never used the word “profiling” in those days, but having long hair automatically made you suspect of a laundry list of high crimes and misdemeanors.

The trooper dutifully checked my license and the bogus rental agreement and asked me where I was going.

“New York,” I replied.

He seemed to grin and develop a twinkle in his eye when he asked me what I was hauling and I told him, “Nothing, sir.”

Visions of drug-bust heaven seemed to dance in his head, and he started to grin from ear to ear when I told him I didn’t mind at all opening the back and letting him look for himself.

I slowly raised the door, and the higher up it went, the lower his jaw dropped.

It seems that during the trip, the hippie couple had pitched a tent toward the back of the box where they were now engaged in what could best be described as “Wild Monkey Sex.” The two winos were passed out on either side of a small mound of empty “Wild Russian Vanya Wine” bottles. The wandering musician and the two GIs were engaged in a tuneful rendition of “Kumbaya” - all under the pale glow of a Coleman electric lantern. The trooper stood stunned, transfixed, flabbergasted. He seemed to stutter and sputter for several seconds before he finally stammered out “What the hell is this?!”

“They were hitchhiking. I gave them a ride,” I quietly replied.

“You can’t do that! Are you crazy? You can’t just run around with people in a truck like this.”

“Okay, I’ll make them get out.”

“You need to do exactly that,” he responded in his best command voice.

“But then they’ll be here hitchhiking on your turnpike,” I observed as I nodded my head toward the group to emphasize the point.

There was a long silent pause as the trooper looked back and forth between me and the group. His shoulders seemed to slump resignedly.

“Well, okay then. Go on, get the hell out of here,” he said.

As I started around to the cab of the truck he called me back, looking me straight in the eye.

“Don’t EVER let me catch you doing this again!”

Elton Manzione

Next: CDLs and CB Jeebies.