NV bus driver Griffith thanked upon retirement

Nodaway Valley students returned home last Tuesday before Thanksgiving Break under the capable and safe care of bus driver Dean Griffith for the last time.

Griffith, 75, decided that would be his cutoff to a career of over 25 years transporting children in area schools.

“In the mid 90s is when I started driving, I know that. I turned 75 in February and that was the cutoff I chose many years ago. I said I wouldn’t drive past that,” Griffith said.

Having the time to devote to driving a school bus was the largest factor Griffith had for starting out. He was friends with then transportation director Jim Paullin of Greenfield as well.

Griffith was a groundskeeper for the school district as well, but retired from that position a decade ago.

“I saw some other men doing it who I thought that if they were doing that, it’s gotta be a pretty good thing,” Griffith said. “I want to stress that it has been a wonderful thing for me. I really enjoyed doing it and had very little trouble over the years. It was 99% smooth. I found that if I respected the kids they respected me.”

Over 500 individuals commented on a social media post from the school congratulating Griffith upon his retirement, and the comments brought many memories to mind for him.

“We had a really good run without much trouble,” Griffith said.

While the entirety of Griffith’s driving career was for Nodaway Valley, he also drove the last three years on field trips for Orient-Macksburg, which shares a transportation director with Nodaway Valley, Derrick Shaull.

Griffith, of Bridgewater, drove the same daily route for much of his career — an area north of Bridgewater and west of Fontanelle Road — but has driven all the routes at some point.

Griffith highly praised past transportation directors he has worked for, including Paullin, Jackie Waltz and Ben Lyons.

Griffith said he doesn’t want to retire without encouraging others to become school bus drivers, as there is a large need in about any school district for the position.

“I highly recommend this job to anyone sitting out there wondering about doing it, because they need them bad. Derrick needs help,” Griffith said. “If someone’s on the fence about it, I highly recommend it.”