School bus yellow is a color which was especially formulated for use on United States school buses in 1939. The color is now officially known in the U.S. as National School Bus Glossy Yellow and was originally called National School Bus Chrome.

In April of that year, Dr. Frank W. Cyr, a professor at Teachers College at Columbia University in New York organized a conference that established national school-bus construction standards, including the standard color of yellow for the school bus. It became known officially as "National School Bus Chrome." The color was selected because black lettering on that hue was easiest to see in the semi-darkness of early morning and late afternoon.

The conference met for seven days and the attendees created a total of 44 standards, including specifications regarding body length, ceiling height and aisle width. Paint experts from DuPont and Pittsburgh Paint participated. Dr. Cyr's conference, funded by a $5,000 grant from the Rockefeller Foundation, was also a landmark event inasmuch as it included transportation officials from each of the then 48 states, as well as specialists from school-bus manufacturing and paint companies. The color was adopted by the National Bureau of Standards (Now the National Institute of Standards and Technology) as Federal Standard No. 595a, Color 13432.

The conference approach to school bus safety, as well as the yellow color, has endured into the 21st century. Dr. Cyr became well-known as the "Father of the Yellow School Bus."

Hex Codes

Of course, buses are not painted on computer screens or printed through color printing processes. For these, in modern times hex codes are used. Most computer monitors are not calibrated for accurate color reproduction, so any color specification can only be approximate. The approximate color of National School Bus Yellow in hex is #FFD800 and in RGB (255, 216, 0) (seen to the right). Another hex code considered to be the correct by many is #FFCC00, which may be useful because it is a web-safe color.

See also

• Safety orange

External links

• Highway Safety Program Guidelines on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration website
• Frank Cyr, Father of the Yellow School Bus
• STN 100 Years of the School Bus