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Fifth Avenue Coach Company bus hit by rocks
Groups of people had been breaking windows around this intersection since not long after 8:30 PM. Even after the arrival of police around 9:30 PM those attacks continued, with incidents of looting beginning around 10:30 PM. Groups of residents were also on the street by that time. The turn to throwing objects at the bus was most likely an extension of the attacks on white businesses than an attempt to injure the passengers on board. Speaking to reporters the day after the disorder, Rev. Adam Clayton Powell of Abyssinian Baptist Church singled out the Fifth Avenue Coach Company as an example of the "continued exploration of the Negro [that] is at the bottom of all this trouble." The company refused to employ Black staff on buses running through Harlem. Given that reputation, the bus company not those on the bus could have been the targets. However, doing so risked hitting Black passengers, given that the bus route ran through the heart of Harlem.
On the other hand, most of the vehicles that traveled on 7th Avenue would have had white drivers and passengers. They may have become targets as those on the streets encountered fewer white men and women on the sidewalks. Seventh Avenue was the most heavily trafficked roadway north of 59th Street, a major route in and out of the city. While Black residents owned and drove cars, automobiles and other vehicles with white drivers made up most of the traffic that passed through Harlem. White passengers may have been the target of the attack on a Boston-bound bus two blocks south to the south. Joseph Rinaldi, a white passenger on that bus, was the one person on board who was injured. Reports of the attack did not mention any Black passengers. All but one of the other vehicles reported as being hit while on 7th Avenue had white drivers. The one exception was Fred Campbell, driving to his barber shops.