Yellow school bus, United States

A Federal Way Public Schools bus in Washington State, 2010, with its red stop sign swung out from the side. The color is no accident: at a 1939 conference convened by Teachers College professor Frank Cyr, school officials adopted 44 national standards for school buses, and one was the shade now called National School Bus Glossy Yellow, picked from 50 paint swatches for how well it shows up in dim light. The long-nosed conventional body is as American as the color.