Robert Jesse Tuggle III

My dad went out like he lived-- in silence.
Bob Tuggle was 82 when he lost his balance at the kitchen door. He had just walked his beloved Bichon Frisé, Holly. By the time I made it to Georgia from California, he was in a hospital bed with a fever and breathing softly. With his hand in hers, my mom told him it was OK to go. A breath later, he died, peacefully and without a word.
Robert Jesse Tuggle III is survived by his wife of 60 years, Betty, his son Michael, his sister Roslyn, three grandchildren, and Holly, of course. Bob, as he was known, was born in 1943 and raised in Atlanta. He never really knew his own father, Robert Jesse Tuggle II. He died of leukemia when Bob was 5 years old. His wife and Bob's mother, Louise, never remarried. Bob spent his summers as a youth on a farm in Forsyth, Georgia with a family friend, where a cute young thing who went by Betty Ruth met the big tall city slicker. She told anyone who would listen, "I'm going to marry that Bob Tuggle." As they were going steady in 1959 & 1960, Bob became a bedrock member of Sylvan High School's back-to-back state basketball champion team known as "Ozzie's Boys." He remained friends with members of that team for the rest of his life. He told me he wasn't much of a shooter or a defender, but he could foul without getting caught better than any of them. Bob married Betty wearing his Army greens. Betty wrote letters pleading with the governor, senator, and their congressmen to not send her groom to Vietnam because RJT the third was the last living male in the Tuggle line. They didn't.
Their first son, Robert Jesse Tuggle the fourth, was born in an Army hospital. I was told that Pops said of using the military hospital, "We might as well since the birth will be free." I was born four years later in 1971. Bob worked as a distribution manager for Arrow shirt company in Florida, Georgia, and Pennsylvania, opening up a world of factory seconds, which became Christmas and birthday presents for years. After my mom, my father's true love was golf. He taught himself... badly. Despite that, he played regularly, right up until the newest driver he could buy wouldn't make the ball fly any further and his laser like putts stopped finding that danged hole.
I believe I am one of the biggest failures of his life. No matter how many hours he spent with me and a nine iron in the back yard or how much money he paid for golf lessons, I never fell in love with the game. "You've got a pretty swing," he'd say to me. The compliment came so easily from his lips, a rarity for my father of few words. It took a lot for him to show love, but we, the people in his life, still knew. He didn't have to say the words and usually didn't. But on the fairway, the court, or the gridiron that stood in contrast. He would effortlessly give a high five, an 'atta-boy,' or a celebratory hug.
When I was in high school, I decided I was going to make it my job to get him to say the words, "I love you," to me. Every night before going to bed, I would walk up to him and stare into his eyes and say, "I love you, Pops." I'd wait. There were a lot of "Uh huh", "Sure", "Yes", "Hmmm", "Of course", and "Yup"'s before he started mumbling those three words. Pops was comfortable with silence, for the words he left unspoken were often better left that way. Spoken aloud, you would get his truth. You learned to not ask him a question that you didn't want the answer to. And with those he loved the most, he never practiced the art of genteel conversation. For almost every day in those 60 years of marriage, my mother made Bob Tuggle a breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert from scratch. Instead of "thank you," he'd tell her what was wrong or what was missing from almost every one of those gloriously hot Southern meals.
Not to say he didn't enjoy every bite. Pops never met a crab he didn't want to boil or a scoop of butter pecan ice cream he didn't want to eat. He lived through two massive heart attacks. The first one hit before he turned 50. The second one arrived on my wedding day in 2008 and the man of few words stayed silent through my service because he didn't want to cause a stir. In 2023, his heart broke not in function but in spirit when his first born died from a massive "widow maker" heart attack. I tried to get him to move out to California after that. Betty bought first class plane tickets without telling him how much they cost. Stubborn to his core, he didn't even lean his seat back, and I don't think he ever really entertained the idea of leaving Georgia. He didn't say it, but Bob Tuggle wanted to die in his home, not some strange assisted living apartment building in Hollywood. He didn't want to use a cane until he started falling. He didn't want to use hearing aids until the volume on his TV couldn't get loud enough. He didn't want to live as a bedridden paraplegic.
Pops didn't tell me he loved me on the last day of his life. It's OK. I held his hand and I told him those words I craved all my life. But he didn't have to look me in the eye and express his emotions. He came to every wrestling match, he came home to his hard working wife every single night, and he stood by you if you were "one of his people" no matter what. He might stand there silent, but you knew.
Family and friends are invited to a celebration of his life on May 3, 2025. It will be held at Parrott Funeral Home on Senoia Road in Fairburn, GA. https://www.parrottfuneralhome.com/
There will be time to visit from 3pm until 4pm. Then we have a short service that may last until 5pm.
Instead of flowers please send a donation to the Hunter Scarbrough Foundation. https://www.hunterman.org/
It is run by family friends who are definitely considered "one of his people."
I also ask that you find someone special to you, and no matter how hard it may be, that you look in their eyes and tell them, "I love you."