VALDOSTA — This year marked the passing of several people who have made a difference in the direction, character and culture of South Georgia.

Today, we remember their passing, but their lives will remain with us for many days and years to come.



ALLEN LOYCE ARNOLD SR., 81, died in January. Employed with the Valdosta Police Department for 33 years, he rose through the ranks to become the Valdosta police chief. A graduate of the FBI Academy, the Georgia Police Academy and the Georgia Military Academy, Arnold also earned recognition for his prize-winning camellias.



JOE LEGGE, 65, artist who created the massive, wooden Viking sculpture in Lowndes High School, died in January. He titled the sculpture “The Last Viking,” and carved its history into the shield. A portion reads: “The Last Viking was imprisoned by a seed of oak in the last period of the Roman Empire. Yes this viking has spent his time in the third largest oak tree the world over for 2,000 years! From an act of God through an artist’s hands — The Last Viking has finally been freed. It took over six months … 2,520 hours of consistent labor to carve this magnificent sculpture.”



HARVEY L. JONES, 85, legendary South Georgia-North Florida dirt-track, race-car driver, died in February. He raced his last lap in 2002 as he neared 80 years old. In an in-depth 1996 article on Jones in Sports Illustrated, Jones said he would quit racing when he no longer won. In that last race, Jones didn’t win, but he didn’t lose either, said his wife of 56 years, Hazel Jones. Jones told Sports Illustrated, “To win the race, you got to be there at the end of the race. These guys who tear up their cars at the start of a race — well, it’s a lot of hooey.”



BISHOP LARRY D. MANNING, 53, of New Life Ministries, died in February of Lou Gehrig’s disease. “Bishop Manning was one of the most phenomenal pastors that Valdosta has ever seen,” said Bishop Wade McCrae of New Greater Union Ministries. “A visionary. … He was the epitome of a pastor. He understood the pastor’s heart.” Manning would do as the biblical passage proclaims, McCrae said. “He’d leave the 99 to save the one.”



CHARLES O’NEAL, 97, unofficially known for several years as “the oldest living Wildcat,” died in February. O’Neal played in the 1929 games often footnoted in Wildcat football programs: “Unspecified penalties were assessed against Valdosta High School for the use of ineligible players. Also, the Albany High game was never finished, as VHS withdrew its team late in the fourth quarter.” O’Neal said a bad call led to the incident. Then-Coach Mike Herndon had quite a temper, O’Neal said. “If he called you in, you had better’ve said, ‘yessir,’ or you wasn’t going in.” An out-of-bounds call piqued Coach Herndon’s temper. The coach argued with officials, but the officials wouldn’t change their call. Instead of telling his players to return to the field, Herndon “told us to take the bus,” O’Neal said. “We got on the bus and went home. We never did finish that game.”



DERRICK JAMES KEATON, 36, Valdosta High School assistant basketball coach, died in February following complications from a kidney transplant. “He never complained. He was a wonderful human being,” VHS Principal Gary Boling said. “He was a gentle heart and was loved by everyone. No one ever had anything bad to say about him.”



BOTIE CHITTY, 81, known to many South Georgians as “Mr. Music” for his Singing Americans shows and other entertainment productions, died in April. “Botie was an accomplished musician, possibly the best to come out of Valdosta and the state of Georgia,” Frances Brown said. “He was confident in his abilities and talents, but he was a humble man, too. … He really was a musical genius.”





DR. BYRON DAVIS, 87, founder of Doctors Laboratory, died in May. In John R. Hickox’s book, “A Few Good Docs,” Davis said how he would like to be remembered: “That I was a caring person, a dependable-type person, one that always felt our world could be better with the little bit of help that I would give …”



WILLIAM BURNS SIRMANS, 66, of Ray City, a well-known supporter of Moody Air Force Base, died in June. “This community never would have made it without Moody,” Sirmans once said. “Moody is the lifeblood of South Georgia, the economic fulcrum of what happens here. We have great leaders from Moody who have retired here and have become part of community leadership … Moody has become our friends and they care about our community. The base is known throughout the world as having the friendliest local community behind it in support. And they have given so much back to us. Moody is us.”



MILDRED HUNTER, 86, educator at time of Valdosta integration, namesake of the Mildred M. Hunter Community Center, a Congressional Black Caucus Spouses’ Unsung Heroes Award recipient, died in June. “She knew she was here in this life to give to others,” Valdosta Mayor John J. Fretti said. She “wanted us to be a community that had no jurisdictional boundaries, no racial boundaries, a place where everyone knew they were brothers and sisters in what we did.” On the civil rights movement, she said, “Oh, it was so exciting to me. It was exciting that I could just go any place I wanted to. It was liberating to go to these places that once were not open to you. I can go anywhere I want to in Valdosta and feel comfortable.”



LOUIE PEEPLES WHITE, 89, World War II Red Cross volunteer, Valdosta supporter of arts, education, and more, died in August. “Valdosta was Louie’s child,” said Donald O. Davis, administrative director of the Lowndes County Historical Society. “She was a cheerleader in 1936 for Valdosta High School and she said she never quit cheerleading for Valdosta.” White once said, “I just love this town. I hear so much about Valdosta from people about how nice it is to live here. It’s the volunteers that make it so special. We have something very special here. I hope people know that.”



J.J. JENNINGS, 71, beloved Valdosta musician and South Georgia athlete, died in August. “He was the best of the best as an entertainer,” said Randall McClellan, a long-time Valdosta musician who had performed with Jennings in the past. “He was like a show in himself. He knew all the songs. He was easy to play along with. … He was a fan of Elvis Presley, but he could go back and perform songs from the ’30s and ’40s, or whatever was currently the hit songs. He was very versatile.”



ESSIE ALLEN SPRUEL, 107, considered by many to have been Valdosta’s oldest resident, died in August. “Don’t expect to bury me tomorrow because I expect to outlive my mother by two years if not more,” Spruel said several years ago on her 102nd birthday. Her mother, Lenary Clark Allen, lived to be 108. Essie Allen Spruel attributed her long life to “serving God as best I can and treating my neighbor as I would like to be treated.”



JIM HALL, 51, a beloved Valdosta entertainer, died in November after a short battle with cancer. “I’ve always focused on what the audience wanted,” Hall once said. If the audience wants to sing, let them sing. If the audience wants to hear a song, play the song. “A lot of musicians complain about requests for ‘Brown-Eyed Girl,’ but if that’s what the audience wants, you’d better give it to them.”



JUDGE W.D. “JACK” KNIGHT, 75, retired Alapaha Judicial Circuit judge, died in November. W.D. “Jack” Knight compared being a judge to his college days serving as a referee for basketball games. “Here, I learned the foundation for being a fair and just judge,” he wrote of his being a referee. “First, I had to observe what had happened; second, I had to determine if what happened was right or wrong; then I had to make a judgment call. Most importantly, this decision had to be right because, once made, the decision could not be reversed!”



DEWEY HAND, 83, of Nashville, died in November. He served as Nashville mayor for several years. He was also an Army veteran in World War II and Korea.



W.P. “BILLY” LANGDALE SR., 88, died in December. A member of the Langdale family, a former Lowndes County commissioner, a board chairman of the Georgia Department of Transportation, honored by the Georgia House of Representatives and Senate, named Georgia Trend magazine’s “100 Most Influential Georgians” as well as South Georgia Business magazine’s list of the “Most Influential South Georgians,” and numerous other honors. He was also a World War II veteran. The book “A Ribbon and a Star,” includes accounts of Langdale’s service in the Marines. Author John Monks wrote: “Lt. Billy Langdale was a great patroller. He begged for the chance to get out in the boondocks. There were always more men wanting to go with him than he would take. Billy had been an outdoor man all his life. … Billy Langdale is a man who has to know; he can’t stand not knowing. But the industrial revolution had never caught up with him. He had always been at home in the woods, and now the jungle was his element.”