As Mickey McAllister, 61, and Wayne Dragon, 65, get ready to run their last season of full-time bus routes, the district they have served for years prepares to say goodbye to the longtime drivers.
Dragon has been a driver for South Colonie for the past 15 years. He came to the district from a job at Sears in the furniture department, which has now closed, where he had worked for 26 years.
A current president of the Fuller Road Fire Department, Dragon said his friends at the firehouse were the ones that actually encouraged him to become a bus driver. He is also an EMT with the department’s first responders and has been with the fire department in different capacities since 1967.
He plans to stay with the fire department even after he retires as a bus driver on Oct. 21, two days after his 66th birthday.
Dragon said he made the decision to retire this year because he wants to be able to spend time with his five children and six a seventh is on the way grandchildren.
`I’ve worked two jobs all my life,` he said.
He said one of his most memorable moments as a bus driver was when he said he saved a man’s life about five years ago.
It was the week students were taking their Regent’s exams, and the bus routes were a little different than usual because of the testing. Dragon was driving on Sand Creek Road when he saw a man lying on the ground in what appeared to be an emergency condition.
Dragon pulled over his car, he said, blocking traffic, so that he could help. He then administered CPR to the man, who was not breathing, and got the man stable enough to transport him to the hospital. The man, who suffered from a health condition, survived the incident.
`That kind of made me feel good,` he said.
Another memory that sticks out in Dragon’s mind is the feeling every year when the students come back to school and greet him with a hug as they hop on the big yellow bus, and catch up with their old friend about their summers.
`When you start a year over and the kids remember you, it makes you feel good,` he said.
At one point, Dragon was out from work because he was ill, and students would see him out around town and tell him they missed him.
Dragon and McAllister said they have seen many students go through the school system and grow up to be successful adults, which, they said, is one of the great benefits of the job.
McAllister, who has been a driver with the district for 25 years, nicknamed Dragon the `King of Corn,` because of his corny jokes, she said. Others in the bus garage call his jokes `Wayneisms,` and have been greeted with one almost every day for as long as he’s been there.
Sitting at a round table in the break room of the bus garage, Dragon told McAllister one of his favorite jokes.
`What happens when you drop a piano down a mine shaft?` he asked. `You hit A minor.`
McAllister shook her head, a smile on her face.
She began training to be a driver in 1984 just four months after her father, who had also been a bus driver for the Capital District Transportation Authority and the North Colonie Central School District.
`It made me feel closer to him,` she said.
At the time, McAllister was one of only 11 women in the 60-person department. Now, she said, it’s about half and half.
McAllister actually drove each of her three children to school at one point or another as all three of them went through the South Colonie Central School District.
`They thought it was pretty funny,` she said of the occasions when they would reach the end of the line to get on the bus and see their mother’s face smiling down at them from the big black seat.
She now has five grandchildren.
McAllister was instrumental in starting the district’s bus safety program, which includes a team of four people that teach students in pre-kindergarten through fourth grade about safety before getting on the bus, while on the bus and getting off the bus. She even illustrated the coloring book the bus safety team passes out to students while teaching them lessons.
McAllister will officially retire Jan. 2, during the winter break and on her 62nd birthday.
Dragon said he plans to come back and be a substitute driver for the district when they need him for a few years after retiring, helping drive students to athletic events and whenever the district needs help. When he is not subbing, Dragon will continue with the Fuller Road Fire Department serving the second of his two-year term as president, and possibly run again for the position. He will also continue to teach fire safety to students in the district, fish and finally use the boat he got three years ago that has never been used, most likely on Lake Champlain, he said.
As for McAllister, she said she is done the day she retires.
When asked what she planned to do in her retirement, McAllister replied, `Anything I want!`
McAllister calls herself a `good shopper` and said she is always finding the greatest deals. She also enjoys many hobbies such as crocheting, painting and gardening.
`This year, I won’t have weeds,` she said.
“