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Thomas SOUTHALL Obituary
He is survived by his wife of 62 years, Jean Riggins Southall; and his four children, Jean S. Beachum and her husband, Vernon of Fort Ashby, W.Va., Susan S. Hancock of Hampton, Thomasine S. Huff and her husband, George of Warner Robins, Ga., and Thomas O. Southall Jr. and his wife, Wendy of Hampton. He is also survived by nine beloved grandchildren, Tiffany Keller (Russell) of Cumberland, Md., Heather Matuse (Cliff) of Wilmington, N.C., Stephen Hancock and Kimberly Hancock of Hampton, Eddie Brown (Holly) of Moody, Ala., Shanon Kerns of Hampton, Tari Watson (Jared) of Cache, Okla., Brooke Southall and Hannah Southall of Hampton and 10 great-grandchildren; a sister-in-law, Mrs. H.T (Dickie) Southall and numerous nieces and nephews.
Tommy was a faithful member of Memorial Baptist Church all of his life. He served on the Board of Deacons, was an usher, was a bus pastor for many years and always greeted people as they arrived for church. He loved getting his hugs from both young and old.
Mr. Southall was in the plumbing business in Hampton until 1967 providing quality plumbing in a large number of the homes built in Hampton. He was a well respected member of the plumbing community. He worked on various construction jobs including Hampton City Hall. He retired while working for Curtis Key Plumbing in Newport News. Once retired he continued to help friends and family with their plumbing needs. He was always willing to give a hand, whatever the need.
A special thanks to the Sentara Careplex ICU and Comfort Care staff and to the staff at Riverside PACE for their caring attitudes and words of encouragement.
The family requests that expressions of love and condolences be expressed by donations to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, American Heart Association, Alzheimer's Association.
The family will receive friends and family on Tuesday, Sept. 21, 2010, from 6 to 8 p.m. at R. Hayden Smith Funeral Home in Hampton.
A celebration of life service will be 2 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2010, at Memorial Baptist Church in Hampton with the Rev. Matthew Childress and Chaplain William Lowrance officiating. Burial will follow in Parklawn Memorial Park. View and post condolences on our online guestbook at dailypress.com/guestbooks.
To plant trees in memory, please visit the Sympathy Store.
Memories and Condolences
for Thomas SOUTHALL
Billy Booth
April 30, 2017
Otha was my best friend in school and we spent many days together. we were like brothers. He was the baby of the family. He older brother took care of Otha as his only child. Buddy will be missed. GOD BLESS. Billy Booth
Frances Bennett
September 29, 2010
I will so miss his smile and his hugs! Even though I haven't been back to Hampton that often recently, he is still such a fixture in my heart and mind at MBC. My lovet to all of the family. I know that he will be missed. I'll be praying for comfort for you all!
Love,
Franny Bennett
September 27, 2010
Presented by the REv William Lowrance at the funeral:
Remembrances of the Southall Family;
I begin with a kind of Confession. For you see, yesterday as Rev Childress and I were visiting with Mr. Tommy Southall’s Family, his Adult Children Jean, Thomasine, Susan and Tom Jr. and a whole crowd of his Grandchildren I was able to hear all of these wonderful , moving tear jerking one second laughter filling the next second stories about the life of this good man. Now most folks I have found usually when visiting with us preacher types , usually wait to tell the best stories after we leave, but just like the Wedding at Cana, this family has adoringly served the best wine of true story first filling my ears with the highs and lows of a man, his loving wife and children ; a gaggle of grandchildren and more adoring nieces and nephews then you can shake a stick at would have if such a thing were ever possible, loved this Daddy, this granddaddy, this Uncle Tommy right on up to the pearly gates of Heaven.
It was told to me clearly that this church played a pivotal role in the weekly formation of their lives with each other and with God. For I was told that if there was even the slightest prayer ever said , that Deacon Tommy Southall was hugging and greeting at the church door and adding his fervent amen when the prayer meeting done. And if during the passage of time on a Sunday morning, Sunday Evening or on a Wednesday night that his loving wife was ever more then ready to offer him a rib re-arranging elbow should his gaze every drift downwards. And even though the Southalls were the very first people on their block to come and place in their den the new black and white technology called television, everyone in that neighborhood knew that if the preacher got inspired and ran over on a Sunday Night that The Ed Sullivan Show would simply have to be turned on late.
That was the only thing that ran late with him because Mr. Tommy Southall was according to his daughter jean the First responder. Susan added, if somebody needed a ride to church he was the chauffeur. It somebody had a plumbing problem he was Mr. Fix-it, Mr. Consultant. When his Granddaughter Kimberly had a small car wreck on Todd’s lane , Mr. Tommy Southall arrived before the police, drove his car diagonally across both lanes of traffic , and he wouldn’t even at the police insistence move his car until he had determined that Kimberly was safe. Whereas there is no doubt that God and family were first and second in Mr. Tommy Southall’s life, I just have to figure that well engined vehicles clocked in a close rumbling second. As a young man I like to think that God graced Mr. Tommy Southall with the Spirit of Mischievousness. You won’t find that particular Spirit listed in any of the New Testament Epistles and his own parents feeling a need to curb their son’s impish glow sent him off to Augusta Military Academy
where-in the trenches of disciplined and daily rigorous surveillance his glow was transformed into a permanent devilish grin. When a young man drove up in a fancy car and parked it under the great oak tree to come a courting one of his sisters, Tommy Southall jacked the car up tied it up with ropes and left it dangling in the air swinging beneath that tree. He was a little bit disappointed when the boy stepped out onto the front porch and told Tommy that because he and Tommy’s sister were double dating with another couple that Tommy would be welcomed to drive his car. Tommy’s model A Ford
had a coil inside of it that was strong enough to light up the Eiffel Tower and Tommy would drive up beside of someone still sitting in their car. Touch their bumpers and he would leap out of his car looking back to see the other driver getting the shock of their life . Son Tommy said that his daddy and three of his buddies became volunteer fire fighters. His daddy had acquired a Chevrolet Convertible formerly used for running liquor and so modified with skid plates running from the front bumper to the rear. According to his one of his daddy’s friends Tommy senior would get up such a head of steam heading for that fire that every bump in the road that car would leap like a frog to the next bump and in fact they credited Tommy Southall senior with taking and personally leveling off every bump on Kickotan Road. Daughter Tomasina shared with me that her daddy was so proud the day he brought home home a brand spanking new 1956 Bel Air with only three miles on the odometer. And even when she reported that her sister Susan had wrecked it at the seven eleven backing up into a light pole, all her Daddy said to her when he saw the dent in the bumper was that he could take out that bend with a mallet. Her Momma grounded her and fussed her up a flag pole, but not her daddy. You see according to her brother and other sisters Susan inherited her daddy’s mischievous nature and one time after racing her 56 Chevy with an experimental corvette engine against a 55 driven by a fellow high school band member who needed to be taken down a notch or two, Susan loss that race. When her daddy got home she told him that something was wrong with the 56. Well her daddy went out to look under the hood and sure enough a spark plug cord was pulled off the connection. “Well”, said Susan that explains. Explains what said her father….Oops the cat was out of the bad. But as Susan said and everybody including the grandchildren agreed , the one thing you didn’t ever want to do was to lie to a Southall….I lost a race..she told him the truth. Well it wasn’t too long after that Susan and her father were sitting in that 56 with Susan at the wheel. At a stop light on Kickotan a car pulled up along-side of them and was gunning his engine. Tommy senior directed Susan to put her left foot heavy down on the brake and to lay the pedal to the metal with her right foot. And when that light changed Tommy Senior and Susan warped ahead like the starship enterprise. As Daughter jean said with a smile and a wink, My dad made sure we were instructed in what we needed to know to how to get through this life. Tommy Junior shared with me that his dad had borrowed his van and when Tom Junior got home his dad said to his son, I guess I need to turn in my driver’s license to you. What said Tommy Jr. Yeah said senior I wrecked your bumper. He had had an accident and rear ended another car. Susan said that when her daddy back into her brand new 73 Dodge Charger that they affectionately called the bent crease the wink, and she still has that car and it is still winking. Well, the mischief doesn’t fall far from the tree, because Grandson Steve taking his Granddaddy home from church pulls out of the church parking lot and floors his engine leaving behind clouds and thunderous roaring which no doubt some of those still standing on the steps of memorial Baptist no doubt thought that Christ might be descending then and their in Clouds of Glory and burning rubber but the only reaction from his Granddaddy Tommy was that impish grin.
Well , according to his son Tommy Junior, Tommy senior made it his life’s project to love his grandchildren as well. Tomasina shared with me that when her son Eddie had childhood pneumonia that he was unable to sleep night or day for what seemed like months. Tomasina’s Daddy would take turns with sitting up and walking him through the night. The next morning without complaining he was off to work. Every Sunday come rain or shine after attending church Tommy and jean would load up their children and go up to Yorktown where he bought them all a coke and some nabs. They would meet up with their cousins and head over to the Memorial battlefield where the kids would play while the adults visited. And every Easter dressed up in white gloves and Easter hats they would make a family portrait standing in front of the Yorktown Battlefield Monument. Jean and Tomasina and Susan and Tommy remember that every night with out fail that they would gather for a family meal at the dinner table and not one bite would be take until they all had arrived and blessed the food.. Although Tommy Senior was known for his warm hugs he was also known to get on the case of his grandchildren when he felt like they might be straying. Zack , Kimberly and Steve agreed that it was nothing to be in upset trouble with their Granddaddy. But the first day back from college and their was Kimberly driving her Grandparents to Applebee’s their favorite restaurant , cooking up something at home, seeing to their needs. Truth was that life had begun taking its toll on their constitution. More and more this independent couple could do less and less for themselves. When Tommy senior had heart surgery the waiting room nurse thought that the whole church had shown up but it was just you children, grandchildren and nieces and nephews, taking off time from work to love and support this man. Then Alzheimer’s took away Jean to a nursing home, her sun downing was too much for him; and this man who had always taken care of every body else began wearing plum out. Tommy senior would call Susan late at night and she knew something was wrong. While still talking to her dad, Susan would call Tommy Junior and like a tag team he would driver over to the house while Susan kept him on the line. Tommy Senior had questioned Jean recently as to why God didn’t come and take him home. One of the last times that Tommy Senior and his wife Jean saw each other Jean was pushing him around at her nursing home in a wheel chair. “ I have missed you,” she said to him. “I have missed you too,” he responded. “Do you still love me”, she quizzed him.” ‘I love you with all my heart,” he told her. “ Well good,” said Jean. “ Does that mean that you are going finally straighten out?”
Close to two weeks in Sentara’s ICU and Tommy Senior’s organs just starting shutting down. He was getting ready to collect his first class ticket to heaven but before he left us his children knew that something was going on. Who and how would they tell their Alzheimer’s inflicted mother whose own memory and cognitive abilities came and went like the tides. You did, two days after your father’s death and your mother when you told her responded by saying, I know Tommy came bye and told me that they were taking him home. I am just mad that they wouldn’t take me with them.” This good Christian man leaves behind a legacy of love, a brightness that helps all of find our way though the dark nights , frustrations and unknowns. His memories remind us of whose we are and from the stuff all of us are made. I would just like to imagine drawing from the promises made to us in scripture and from these wonderful memories of his family that when Tommy Southall Senior arrived up at those heavenly gates that he opened his eyes and breathed deeply for the first time in a long time; and there stood God just as clear as day leaning up side of vintaged Cadillac Hurst with an experimental corvette engine; and when God hands Tommy Senior the keys they both get in and with the left foot on the brake and the right foot Tommy Senior puts the pedal to the metal and together they enter those pearly gates of heaven with thunderous clouds and the smell of rubber burning. Amen!
September 25, 2010
Mr. Southall will be sadly missed by the neighborhood and his neighbors. Just know that he is in a better place now and we will see him again. May God bless the family. Min. Carolyn B. Batts and Family, Hampton, VA your neighbors
Arline & Bobby Silverthorn
September 23, 2010
Our thoughts and prayers are with you in your time of grief. May your memories bring you comfort.
Gary B
September 22, 2010
Tommy,
I was sadden to read about your fathers' passing.
I trust that God will bring comfort to you and your family at this time.
Based on passed conversations with you, I can say your father was definately a tremendous blessing to you all. I trust that the memories that have been made, will forever enrich your lives to come. God Bless you friend!
ed gwaltney
September 21, 2010
tommy will greatly be missed and old time friend from the days at hygea skateing rink with his 40 chev conv what find we had together i no jean and family will realy miss him
September 21, 2010
Susan and family: Your father greeted me many times with his smile and hand shake as I walked through the doors of Memorial Baptist Church. May the love of those around you help you through the days ahead. Hold tight to the memories for comfort. Lean on your friends for strength and always remember how much you are cared about.
Charme Brown Dawson (Colorado Springs, CO)
September 21, 2010
My sincerest sympathy to all of you in your great loss. You're in my thoughts & prayers. Comfort xo's to you. Margaret Ann (Hazel's Sister)
James Wright, Jr.
September 21, 2010
Tommy,
My prayers are with you and your family through this difficult time, but knowing your Dad has now been healed and is in the loving arms of our Savior has to be sweet. Through God's ultimate sacrifice of his son Jesus all of God's people will be reuinted together one day in the presence of his awesome glory. God Bless you all, your friend Jim Wright, Jr.
Min. Valerie Perry-Jackson
September 20, 2010
Susan & Family,
My thoughts and prayers are with you in your time of grief. May God comfort you and keep you in His arms during this difficult time.
Ruth & Melvin Johnson
September 20, 2010
My thoughts and prayers are with you in your time of grief. May your memories bring you comfort.
Maria & Rob Marston
September 20, 2010
Susan,
You and your family are in our thoughts and prayers. May you find strength and comfort in the happy memories you shared together.
We will be offering special prayers on behalf of your father at the Wednesday morning service at St. Andrew's.
Fondly,
Janie Kissinger
September 20, 2010
Jean ~
We have you and your family in our thoughts and prayers. Your Dad will always be with you in all the great memories you've made over the years.
May you feel our love and prayers and God's love and presence now and always.
Janie and John
John {Pete} and Alise Freeman And Family
September 20, 2010
Dear Ones'
We are very sorry for your loss, but rejoice with you, that you have the assurance that your loved one is with the Lord now...safely on the other shore.
Tommy and Jean have been wonderful neighbors for many years. We will miss them terribly.
God bless and keep you in His perfect peace at this time and always.
Vanessa Pratt
September 19, 2010
My prayers go out for the entire family and extended families. May God's loving arms wrap around the family during this time of sorrow. Will truly miss this dear Child of Gods.
Mary Flynn
September 19, 2010
Tom and Wendy, Brooke and Hannah,
We are very sorry for your loss. Please know our thoughts and prayers are with you during this time of loss.
Mary Flynn and Jake, Jordan, Jeff, Jesse and Jonah Blas
Caryn Coley
September 19, 2010
Susan, I was sorry to get your call this morning with the news about your father. My thoughts and prayers are with you and your family. My memories of your father go back a long way...to our days at Thorpe Jr. High. I look forward to hearing many stories of happy memories from you in the future. Love, Caryn
Donna Dean
September 19, 2010
Our love and prayers go out to the entire family at this time of sorrow. He has been met at the doors of heaven with open arms. Love Donna Reynolds Dean, Jackie Reynolds, Sara Dean Gardner, T.J. Dean
Donna Dean
September 19, 2010
Our love and prayers go out to the entire family at this time of sorrow. He has been be met at the doors of heaven with open arms. Love Donna Reynolds Dean, Jackie Reynolds, Sara Dean Gardner, T.J. Dean
Stephen Hancock
September 19, 2010
God has received in to heaven a faithfull servant......
Joe and Jen Miller
September 19, 2010
Mr. Tommy will always be held in high regards. A neighbor and friend for six years, he helped whenever, however he could, with anything and everything. I'm so glad God let him become part of my life, and my extended "family". Rest in Peace.
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