Article published October 11, 2009
Bedford principal honored for school bus safety mirror
Jerry Kish, above, a 1951 Bedford graduate, was a driving force behind the idea to honor former Principal Reid Stout, credited with being the inventor of the school bus safety mirror. The historical marker heralding the part-time bus driver's invention is in Lambertville.
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THE BLADE/DAVE ZAPOTOSKY
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By MARK REITER
BLADE STAFF WRITER
LAMBERTVILLE - School bus drivers can thank a high school principal for making their jobs easier.
Nearly 60 years ago, Reid Stout, then principal and part-time bus driver for Bedford Rural Agricultural Schools, designed and installed the very first safety-crossing mirrors on school buses on the district's bus fleet.
The convex mirrors, which are still in use in modern form on school buses today, allow the driver to peer down into blind spots on the road.
Mr. Stout, who died in 1986, assembled and sold the panoramic mirrors out of the garage of his Lambertville home for many years.
He started the Safety Cross Mirror Co., supplying the product to companies that built school-bus bodies and other vehicles.
Yesterday, a historical marker recognizing the achievements of Mr. Stout - a nearly 25-year employee of Bedford Township schools - was dedicated at Olde Schoolhouse Commons, which many years ago was Lambertville High School.Jerry Kish, a 1951 Bedford High School graduate who was a student in Mr. Stout's chemistry class, was instrumental in getting the marker erected at the old school.
"It needed to be done because what he did was a very historical event," he said. "These mirrors are used around the world. It is really a bigger thing than what people think."
The idea for the mirror was born out of a near tragedy that occurred in the late 1940s while Mr. Stout was driving a school bus for the rural school district.
After getting off the bus, a 9-year-old girl dropped her books and kneeled down to pick them up, out of Mr. Stout's view from behind the wheel of the bus.
Fortunately, the children who had gotten off the bus at the same time yelled to Mr. Stout, who was just seconds from putting the bus into gear to resume his route.
The girl, Suzanne Hetzel-Tracy, recalled that Mr. Stout put the bus in park and got out to see her on the ground scooping up her belongings.
Mrs. Hetzel-Tracy, 70, said Mr. Stout's alertness probably saved her life.
"I have a wonderful husband and two wonderful sons. I have had a wonderful life and I can thank Reid for that. It could have turned out differently if he wasn't on his toes," she said.
Shaken from the near accident, Mr. Stout dwelled on the incident, and months later got his inspiration for the safety mirror from a metallic outdoor gazing ball.
He told The Blade in 1965 that he cut away part of a drug mixing bowl in a convex shape that allowed him to see in all directions and took the model to a mirror-plating firm that duplicated it into a dozen mirrors.
The mirrors were mounted above the windshields of all township buses in 1950. It allowed drivers to see within three to four feet of the right front wheel.
Mr. Stout's invention caught the attention of other school districts. The mirrors were put on buses in Sylvania, Toledo, and Dundee, Mich.
He demonstrated the mirror before Michigan Department of Education officials in Lansing shortly after a youngster was killed by a bus in Center Line, Mich.
The department got the state Legislature to make the safety mirrors mandatory on all Michigan school buses.
Ray Westmoreland, a retired transportation director for the Houston Independent School District, recalled that the convex mirrors were placed on the school system's bus fleet in the 1960s.
Mr. Westmoreland, a founding member of the National Association for Pupil Transportation, said the device was monumental in improving the safety of schoolchildren.
"We thought it one of the greatest things. It opened up a blind spot that we had not been able to see," he said. "I believe that the convex mirror is probably one of the most, if not the most important thing, as far as improving visibility around the school bus, where kids can be subjected to danger."
Mr. Stout attended Blissfield High School and graduated in 1935 from Adrian College, where he excelled in football, baseball, and track.
He taught and coached at Temperance School. He served as principal until the building burned down in 1946, when students transferred to the Lambertville school.
He was instrumental in the consolidation of Temperance and Lambertville schools into the Bedford system.
After retiring in the late 1950s from the district, he devoted his full attention to the convex mirror.
With parts supplied by area firms, including Michigan Tube Swedges Inc., now MTS Seating, he and his late wife, Lucille, supplied their mirrors to bus and vehicle manufacturers until he retired in 1976. Their son, now deceased, continued in the business.
Patricia Swy, the wife of the late Paul Swy, co-founder of MTS Seating, donated the money for the historical marker.
Contact Mark Reiter at:
markreiter@theblade.com
or 419-724-6199.
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