Wayne is a name in school transportation that predates the familiar yellow bus seen all over the USA and Canada, beginning in the 19th century. First with all-steel bodies for motorized vehicles in the 1920's, craftsmen in Richmond, Indiana at Wayne Works, its subsidiaries and successors, built not only school buses, but virtually all types of bus bodies during the 20th century, including highway coaches, military and shuttle buses, and even huge bodies pulled by tractor trailers used to haul oil field workers in the middle east. The company built ambulances during World War II and later through several subsidiaries.

With manufacturing at Richmond, Wayne bodies were assembled at multiple locations around the US and Canada at the Welles plant. Kits were also shipped overseas even after all North American assembly was centralized in Richmond and Windsor,Ontario.

Wayne went through many changes, including periods of DIVCO-Wayne, Miller-Meteor, and Indian Head, and finally closed in 1992. Military truck builder Wayne Wheeled Vehicles assembled several products from 1993 to 1995 in Ohio. Former Wayne personnel even built Carpenter and Crown branded buses at the Richmond Indiana facility in the late 1990's.

Among many innovations, Wayne pioneered the inboard wheelchair lift and high-headroom doors for persons requiring head and neck support from above. The company was first with a school bus based upon a cutaway van chassis, a practical design which became widespread. Wayne's crowning achievement was the Lifeguard conventional design in 1973, which featured continuous interior and exterior longitudinal panels, and paved the way for the all-important US minimum construction standards for all school buses in 1977.

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