Joseph Melvin Fletcher, age 72, went home to be with the Lord on Sunday January 13, 2019, as a result of a bout with double pneumonia on top of multiple myeloma, a blood cancer he had survived for ten years. Mr. Fletcher was born and raised in Douglas, son of the late Dewey and Linnie Fletcher and grandson of Esterlee Jowers, who loved and lent his name to the well-known Jowers Chapel in Coffee County.
Joe attended Coffee County High School where he gained much popularity as a member of the Comet football team, being named lineman of the year in 1963. His love of football remained a lifelong pleasure, along with his joy in flying both power planes and gliders. Mr. Fletcher graduated from South Georgia College in 1965. He then attended University of Georgia for a year before joining the United States Navy. He spent two years aboard the destroyer, the USS Stribling, serving in the Gulf of Tonkin, the Western Pacific and the Mediterranean.
Following his military service, he received a degree in land development from Georgia State University. During his studies at Georgia State, he began working for the Georgia Department of Transportation, where he had a thirty year career as a traffic engineer, ultimately retiring as the Assistant State Traffic Operations Engineer. He spent an additional nine years with Cobb County DOT. He was awarded the Transportation Professional of the Year in 2011 for outstanding contributions to transportation in Georgia. He was a member of the Church of the Apostles in Buckhead, Atlanta, Georgia. After retiring in 2009, Mr. Fletcher and his wife, Cornelia, resided in Tifton.
Survivors include his wife, Cornelia Hammond Fletcher of Tifton; brother, Norman Fletcher and family of Douglas; Tommie Lee (Mrs. Fred) Taylor and family of Albany; step-son, Robert Harmon and family of Grain Valley, Missouri.
He was preceded in death by three sisters, Grace Barrett, Cleo Lewis and Carolyn Brantley.
Funeral services will be held on Thursday January 17, 2019 at 1:30 pm at Sims Funeral Home Chapel with Rev. William Watson. Entombment will follow at the Dixie Mausoleum in the Douglas City Cemetery. The family will receive friends Thursday from 12:30 pm until 1:30 pm prior to the service at the funeral home.
The family request memorials to The Myeloma Institute, 4301 West Markham St. #716, Little Rock, Arkansas, 72205.
Sims Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.