Fauquier Co. woman still going strong after 55 years as school bus driver

She is a familiar face to dozens of local students in Fauquier County. Lois King will turn 80 years old soon, but you wouldn't know it. She has marked a huge milestone and she is quite a character.

Her hands tell the story.

"These things are claws," King said. "That's what I call them."

But she has proven it over time.

"Yeah, I've got a reputation of being a hard worker," she said.

In 1960, King took a job as a bus driver for the Fauquier County Public Schools. She wanted to help pay the bills and be able to take her own kids to work with her.

"The baby would be in a little bassinet sitting on the seat and the kids would come and watch," she said.

Now approaching her 80th birthday, King is still at it. The school system gave her a rocking chair for 55 years of service, but sitting really isn't her thing.

"I sit to eat, I sit to watch TV," she told us. "Other than that, I'm doing something."

King is often working on her farm in Marshall, Virginia.

"I do all of this myself," she said. "All the weed eating and the lawn mowing."

I can vouch for her driving as she gave me a ride on her tractor. Being behind the wheel is where she is most at home.

"This is perfect," she said.

Other than her seven kids, the farm is what she is most proud of. Freedom is what she likes about being out here.

When she heard we were coming to interview her, King said, "I about fell off the tractor. I thought, ‘My God, I can't believe this.'"

She is a little embarrassed about being on television and she doesn't like to show off.

"I'm just an ordinary peon farmer, bus driver -- nothing special," said King.

She is not shy about being tough on the kids she meets along her rural bus route, especially once they start high school.

"I say this isn't kindergarten anymore," said King. "It's high school. Act like it.

"I said good morning to every one of them and said goodbye to every one of them. Some of them don't answer, but I keep on saying it."

She offers advice to those kids and the rest of us.

"Get out and do something that makes you sweat and think good thoughts," she told us. "That is the best thing."

King has no plans to retire.

"I don't quit much of anything," King said. "I just keep on rolling."