Robert Paul Bayless

February 3, 1932 – June 22, 2025

Robert Paul Bayless was born on February 3, 1932, in Cullman, Alabama to C.M. “Brim” and Mary Myrtle Silvey Bayless. He died at the age of 93 on June 22, 2025, of complications from kidney disease.

At an early age, Bob, as he was known, and his older brother, Bill, moved with their parents to Pulaski, Tennessee where Brim took a job as a printer. The family lived on a farm where the boys had lots of room to roam and play. Bob started first grade in 1938 beginning a long life of learning.

Bob and Bill also had chores on the farm including feeding all the animals. Bob never forgot the day that one of the Billy Goats ate his mother’s new dress off the clothesline. It might have been the same goat who climbed on top of their car and poked holes in the canvas roof with its hooves. On Mondays, it was his job to mind the print shop so that his father could make deliveries and collect payments.

When World War II began, Brim was too old to serve in the military, but he wanted to help with the war effort. The family relocated to Tampa, Florida where Brim took a job in the shipyard as a security guard. The family also sold cast iron pots and pans door to door. Bob cleaned the iron pans before they delivered to customers. He also held down a paper route. The family attended Palm Avenue Baptist Church.

Bob attended Hillsborough High School in Tampa. But during his freshman year, his family moved to Anna Maria, Florida. With World War II’s end, the Army no longer needed the land on the north end of the island where it had established a military base to protect Tampa Bay. Brim purchased several lots and began building houses. Florida’s post war population boomed as soldiers who had once been stationed or recuperated from injuries in that state moved their families to the tropical climate. The demand for Florida homes was high. Bob helped with the building construction when he was not in school at Manatee High School or staying after school for football practice.

Island teenagers rode the school bus from the north end of Anna Maria through Holmes Beach to Bradenton Beach and across the Cortez Bridge and on to Manatee High School. When a hurricane knocked out the Cortez Bridge, they took a ferry to the mainland and caught the bus. If Bob stayed for football practice or missed the bus, he hitchhiked back to the island. When his grades began to suffer, he abandoned the hope of a football career.

Life on the island was not all work and no play, however. Bob attended youth group at Roser Community Church and First Baptist Church of Bradenton and along with his parents and brother helped to start Island Baptist Church. With no buildings or piers to obstruct their path, Bob recalled water skiing behind a jeep all the way around the tip of the island.

There were also community events to help manage and attend. Bob remembered driving the old volunteer fire company truck to a water play day when the brakes went out. To avoid hitting pedestrians, he slammed the truck into a fire hydrant! He also told stories about the many rattlesnakes on the island and how they could be found curled up behind refrigerators, sunning on the roads, or swimming in the bay. Bob and his friend, Petey Moore, earned money by driving truckloads of scallops to Miami and returning with lobsters.

It was on the island that Bob met the woman who would become his wife, Florence Emily Pace of Mulberry, Florida. Emily’s family spent their summers on the island, but what might have been a summer romance, lasted for seventy-five years, five years of dating and seventy years of marriage. The couple was married on Christmas Eve in 1954.

Bob graduated from Manatee High School in 1950. After a year in the Naval Reserves, he went to boot camp and then, served as a hospital corpsman for four years. The first year, he lived in Maryland working at the Bethesda Medical Hospital. Then, he spent two years traveling the world on a minesweeper, visiting countries along the Mediterranean Sea and in the Pacific Ocean. It was here that a thirst for travel began. His last year in the Navy, he served in South Carolina, doing labs for new recruits.

After his term of service and Emily’s graduation from Florida State University, the couple moved to Gainesville, Florida, and Bob enrolled in University of Florida School of Engineering. After graduation, Bob took a civil engineering job with Misener and McEvoy beginning a lifelong career in the marine construction industry.

Bob and Emily moved to Pinellas County, Florida in 1959 with their daughter, Catherine (Cathy). Their second daughter, Stephanie, was born in 1960. By 1965, they were living in St. Petersburg where they would live until 1979 when they moved to Terra Ceia Island in Manatee County.

Bob’s hard work and skills in engineering and management propelled him up the career ladder to become the president of Gulf Foundation, Inc., a subsidiary of Misener Marine. In this role, he oversaw much of the marine construction and building foundations at Disney World in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He had many memories of his work on the creation of Bay Lake, the docks for the first resorts including the Polynesian Hotel, the Contemporary Hotel, and Fort Wilderness Campground as well as foundations under

Space Mountain, the Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Tom Sawyer’s Island. He was always impressed with the Disney Corporation’s ethics and appreciation for the environment, remembering times when all construction stopped until a deer or other wildlife could be moved from the construction site. Bob’s work at Disney World made him a hero with his daughters and their friends when the family enjoyed an invitation to a premier of the park before it opened to the public.

In 1981, Bob was promoted to the presidency of Misener Marine. In this capacity he travelled around the world surveying and overseeing marine construction particularly in Central American and the Caribbean. His company helped to build the Skyway Bridge and the Seven Mile Bridge in the Keys.

When he retired from Misener Marine, Bob worked for ten years at George F. Young and in a third career served on dispute review boards mediating conflicts between road contractors and the State of Florida. He worked until he was 82 and he began kidney dialysis after losing function in both of his kidneys.

Bob considered his most important work, not his engineering career, but his service to the churches to which he belonged, Fifth Avenue Baptist Church in St. Petersburg and First Baptist Church of Palm View in Palmetto, Florida. Serving as a deacon, Sunday School Superintendent, Sunday School teacher and on a variety of committees, he invested his life in the lives of others. He was a teacher, mentor, advisor, and counselor to many. He was always the first to give of his finances, time and talents and leaves many people thankful for his help.

Bob loved to travel. He and Emily travelled around the world and ensured that their daughters were well travelled. Along with Emily, Bob took many trips in their motor home across the United States. They spent many summers following the route of explorers, Lewis and Clark, with their grandsons, Rob and Tim.

He was also involved with Civil Air Patrol and enjoyed training middle and high school cadets.

Bob was a loving husband and father, a vibrant storyteller, faithful friend, steadfast Christian, and wise counselor. He was predeceased by his wife of seventy years, Emily Pace Bayless. He leaves behind his daughters, Cathy Slusser (Glen) and Stephanie Lenart (Bob), four grandchildren, Robert Slusser, Robert Lenart, Timothy Slusser (Miranda) and Emily Lenart, great grandson, Jonah Robert Slusser, many nieces, nephews, cousins, and a host of friends.

The family would like to thank Maria Ramiro, Chaplain Michael Hale of Freedom Village, and Rev. Tom Winters for their love and support. Also, the staff of the Bradenton Tidewell

Hospice House, the staff of Freedom Village of Bradenton, especially the third-floor staff, the staff of Cooper Family Medicine, especially the Residents, the staff of Pointe West Fresenius Medical Care, and the staff of the Cardiac Wing of Manatee Memorial Hospital for their excellent care.

A Memorial Service will be held on Saturday, June 28, 2025, at 2:00 PM at Groover Funeral Home, 1400 36th Avenue East, Ellenton, Florida. Reverend Tom Winter will officiate.

In appreciation for the excellent care of the staff of Bradenton Tidewell Hospice, the family requests instead of flowers that donations be made to Tidewell Foundation, 3550 S. Tamiami Trail, FL 1, Sarasota, Florida 34239 or to his home church, First Baptist Church of Palm View, 415 49th Street East, Palmetto, Florida, 34221.