Paul Carroll, Kansas City bus driver known as ‘The Mayor of 39th Street,’ dies at 74

The man known around southeast Kansas City as the Mayor of 39th Street proudly bestowed the nickname upon himself, sometime during the 1970s, because he felt it was the plain truth, his surviving family members said.

The rest of the community agreed.

Paul Carroll was a fixture in the lives of those who lived in the area of 39th Street and Prospect Avenue. His cousin, Joe Looney, owned the candy shop on the corner, and Carroll would stand in the parking lot in his unmistakable apple hats, with their pillowy poofs and vibrant colors.

He razzed friends and neighbors who came into the store, giving them nicknames of their own, like “Brainiac” or “Tight Pants.”

He claimed the block as his, and no one argued with him. Carroll, a Navy veteran, always gravitated to the spotlight, which was why he liked his job as a bus driver for the Kansas City school district. He would report to work dressed in his apple hats, denim overalls and shiny Stacey Adams shoes, stone-cold serious about the task at hand, according to his nephew, Mark Burks, 60.

He had a reputation as the only driver who could get a bus full of antsy children to sit still. Other buses would pull into the parking lot accompanied by the dull roar of overlapping voices, Burks recalled with a laugh. His, however, was silent and the kids exited in an orderly fashion, to the bafflement of teachers.

“They were like, ‘How did you do this?’” Burks said over the phone from his home in Phoenix. “He says, ‘I do not play. This is my bus. This is the mayor’s bus.’”

Carroll died Dec. 7, following a short stay at a VA hospital for a fairly routine surgery to get stents planted in his legs to combat soreness and poor circulation. The family is still unsure what caused his sudden death, Burks said; he went to the bathroom before he was to check out and then collapsed. He was 74.

Carroll is survived by his daughter, Katina Robinson; son, Paul Carroll Jr.; sister, Mary Burks; and brother Elmer Carroll. He also leaves behind 20 nieces and nephews and four grandchildren.

In recent days, Kansas Citians have posted tributes on social media to a man who left an indelible impact on many, even those who only knew him in passing. Some remarked he was their bus driver and they still remember him all these years later. Others said they used to see him around the candy store in his signature caps. One Facebook user, echoing the sentiments of hundreds more in the comments, wrote, “Everyone knew the mayor.”

Born Jan. 29, 1947 in Kansas City, Carroll was the youngest of four children, with two older sisters and a brother. He graduated from Paseo High School in 1965 and shortly after joined the Navy with his best friend at the height of the Vietnam War.

It was something they had discussed doing together but they wound up serving separately, with Carroll at home and his friend abroad. Carroll was stationed in Long Beach, California, a crewman responsible for the grim and thankless work of receiving the bodies of soldiers killed overseas. One day, on the job, he saw the lifeless body of his friend in a casket. “He didn’t know until he laid his body down,” Burks said. “Almost like a movie script.”

When Carroll returned home, he took on odd jobs, like working in a shipping warehouse, and tried to re-immerse himself in his family and social life. He was a skilled artist, according to family, and painted his mother’s basement with a dizzying collage of his cartoon creations.

Though he didn’t speak much about the loss of his friend, those close to him knew he continued to hurt, in spite of his sunny demeanor. But his life went on: He became a caring father to two children. He never married.

To his nieces and nephews, Carroll was the fun — and funny — uncle who knew how to commit to the bit. Burks remembers him rapidly ringing their doorbell 15 times to announce he had arrived, and then storming into the house in a huff pretending to be angry at their laziness. He would shout, as Burks recounted, “Everybody get up!”

Burks’ sister, Yolanda Brown, 60, said in the punishing heat of summer her uncle would take her and her cousins to get ice cream before stopping at the fountain across the street from Southeast High School. He let them swim in the cool water, even though they weren’t supposed to, Brown said. “He was the guy who walked into a room and you knew he was gonna make the air light,” she said. “He’s gonna make a joke to make you feel better.”

Bertha Ross, a 44-year-old niece who resides in Kansas City, saw her uncle as her fierce protector who would take her side in any argument. He always told her she was his favorite niece, Ross said; of course, she knew he said that to whichever niece he was talking to at that moment.

Carroll’s many nieces and nephews had to figure out on their own that, though they called him uncle, many more saw him as some sort of important figure. They saw the respect he received, the cordial way people talked to him.“ We knew that everybody thought he was the mayor of 39th Street,” Brown said. “He kind of ran that block. He kept the peace.”

His final year as a school bus driver was in 1994 and he spent the next couple decades as a retired family man and loyal neighborhood stalwart, while occasionally putting in work at his niece’s cleaning company.

Carroll, a few months back, reflected on life and death with Brown, she said. He spoke about how heaven is a great place to be, as Brown recalls, and earth is only a place to pass through. He wanted her to remember that.

The family believes now the mayor has made it to that final resting place.

“Everything my uncle did was about making fun for us, making us happy,” Brown said. “Everything about him was positive.”

A funeral service for Carroll was held Wednesday at Watkins Heritage Funeral Home. He will be buried at Leavenworth National Cemetery at 10 a.m. Monday.

Other remembrances

Sarah Tyrus

Sarah Tyrus, a devoted mother and activist shaped by her childhood education in a one-room schoolhouse with her siblings, died Nov. 24, her family said in an obituary, shared by Thatcher Funeral Home. She was 101.

Tyrus was born March 10, 1920 in Moberly, Missouri, almost a decade before the start of the Great Depression. One of eight children, she attended classes in the schoolhouse taught by her father, a professor.

He eventually grew ill, which was when the two oldest sisters took over the homeschooling. The family moved to Kansas City, Kansas, when Tyrus was a girl. She graduated from Sumner High School in Kansas City and attended Lincoln University in Jefferson City, where she met and married her husband, with whom she had four children in the city where they fell in love.

They later moved to her hometown of Kansas City, Kansas and had another five children. Tyrus, like her father, was heavily involved in her children’s education — serving as president on two of her children’s PTA boards, at the same time. She also took pleasure in teaching her kids to read and write. She worked as a Certified Nurse’s Assistant as a young woman, family said, and later taught preschoolers in Shawnee.

In her personal life, Tyrus was described as a woman of conviction, serving as a member of the NAACP and the Johnson County chapter of Jack & Jill of America. The leadership organization, founded by African American mothers in the 1930s, gave her a special celebration on her 100th birthday in 2020.

Tyrus was a dedicated member of First Baptist Church in Kansas City, Kansas, and family said she joined the choir in every church she was ever a part of. She’s survived by her children, Carolyn Hobbs Carmen Brass, Spencer Tyrus and Philip Tyrus; sister Phyllis C. Thomas and brother Edward Brown; and nieces, nephews, grand-children and great-grandchildren.

Her funeral was held Dec. 11 at First Baptist Church.

Wanda Payne

Wanda Payne, a Kansas City mother of six and auditor who accomplished a long-held goal by going back to college to get her accounting degree, died on Dec. 3 of pancreatic cancer, her family said in an Elite Funeral Chapel obituary. She was 74.

Wanda Price was 26 in 1973 when she married John F. Payne and left her home in Oklahoma for Kansas City, Missouri, following his career. It was necessary for them to move so John Payne could attend law school at the University of Missouri-Kansas City as they started a family.

Wanda Payne held a job, too, at Western Auto’s corporate offices. She had attended the historically black Langston University in Oklahoma but never graduated, family said. And as her children got older, it became a regret.

When one of her kids was enrolling at her husband’s alma mater, UMKC, John Payne surprised his wife by signing her up for classes too. She kept her job at Western Auto as she went to classes part-time. In 1989, she received her bachelor’s degree in accounting.

She retired from Western Auto in 2002 and, from 2003 to 2009, served as an auditor for the state of Missouri.

Payne, who was born July 19, 1947 in Rentiesville, Oklahoma, was raised in the Baptist church. She became a member of the Temple of Faith Missionary Baptist Church in Kansas City in 1983, serving in the finance room, and as a deaconess.

She is survived by her sister, Pat Hill; six children, named Tanya, Christopher, Brian, Corey, Adrienne and Joshua; and 14 grandchildren.

Her funeral was set to be held Saturday at Temple of Faith.

Bobbie Reynolds

Bobbie Reynolds, a father of three with a passion for cars, motorcycles and using his hands to fix anything that was broken, died on Dec. 9, his family said in an obituary on the Serenity Funeral Home website. He was 73.

Reynolds was born July 6, 1948 in Ripley, Tennessee, but his family moved to Kansas City, Missouri, when he was a child.

He graduated from East High School in 1966, family said, and attended Central Missouri State College for only one year. He chose instead to go into the workforce and, in 1968, marry the love of his life. They had three children.

He spent 35 years working at Armco Steel, eventually retiring in the role of yard labor supervisor. His hobbies outside of work also often had to do with a little hard work — he loved fixer upper projects and caring for cars, like his cherished white ‘98 Oldsmobile with a maroon top. He relished riding in his car and his motorcycle.

His nickname, in motorcycling circles, was “Puppy,” family said. He garnered other monikers over the years, from Suave Bob to Bobbie Love to Papa Love. But the most important nickname to him, given to him by his wife, was “Love,” or, sometimes, “Love Reynolds.”

Reynolds is survived by his wife, Pam Reynolds; son, Craig T. Reynolds; daughters, Kimberly Reynolds-Gray and Robyn Reynolds; sister, Patricia Reynolds; brothers, William Reynolds and Richard Reynolds; and cousins, nieces, nephews, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

His funeral was held Friday at Serenity Funeral Home in Kansas City, Missouri.

This story was originally published December 19, 2021 at 5:00 AM.