Ernest Crutchfield

E. Bryant "Crutch" Crutchfield passed away surrounded by family on Sunday, August 21st, 2022 at Tranquility Hospice Center in Marietta, Ga. Born in 1937 to Ralph and Belle Crutchfield in Greenville, AL, he was an only child. Both of his parents worked at the Alabama Mill cotton mill in Greenville. He was popular in high school and a natural leader. He was the first in his family to attend college and to graduate. While attending Auburn, he was president of the Delta Chi fraternity and was on the Intra-Fraternity Council. After college, he joined Montag which eventually became part of the Mead paper corporation. He spent 34 years at Mead and then another 10 years at Georgia Pacific before retiring. He started his career in Atlanta, GA and retired in Atlanta. But he and his family also relocated to and from his second home, Dayton, OH twice during his career.

Crutch had a strong personality. He was always cracking a joke and liked to be around people and entertain. If you ever met Crutch, you would remember him. He was proud of his business accomplishments and the people that he met along the way. Among other things, he invented the Trapper Keeper? notebook and had seven US Patents in his name. He was an innovator and an outside the box thinker.

After retiring, he would reflect on his life and share stories about experiences he had in business like developing friendships with former NFL stars when running annual sales meetings, or his time at Harvard when Mead sent him to study business management. Every once in awhile he'd bring up an amazing new story or reflection that we'd never heard before.

Most of all, Crutch was proud of his family and would speak about them to anyone that would listen. He is survived by his wonderful and loving wife Virginia, his son Ken (and wife Mary) and his daughter Carol Iyer (and husband Shekhar), six grandchildren (Daniel, Sarah, Nicole, Nate, Samantha, and Sam), two great-grandchildren and other family and friends.

Crutch's final month was not without pain or suffering. Through all of his discomfort, he kept his sense of humor and his love of family and family time came into sharp focus. He also was contrite and made amends with people and with his Creator.