Joseph A. Thacker

February, 13, 1921 - May, 18, 2012

Dr. Joseph Allen Thacker, age 91, surrounded by his family, went to be with the Lord Friday, May 18th at Mountain City Rehabilitation and Care nursing home where he was affectionately called Dad Thacker.

Joe was born February 13, 1921 in Coal Fork, WV where his dad, Joseph Allen Thacker served as a butcher in a coal company store. Elizabeth Pauline ‘Babe’ Burgroff Thacker was a loving mother to her three boys Rodney, Robert and ‘Jody’, as Joe was called as a boy. They lived in a number of coal camps before settling in Charleston, WV. The first 25 years of his life were rough. As Joe wrote in 1991, At the age of 5 an injury to my right eye left me basically blind in that eye and fed a feeling of deep hatred of my self and others. Living through the Great Depression, watching the degeneration of our home, see my father become an alcoholic and ultimately heading for the same dead end deepened my despair.

During those years I was many things, fighter, thief, and by the period of WWII, a drinker. There were positive influences, which I believe, were evidences of God’s love for me. Some wonderful caring teachers crossed my life and fed a longing for what seemed to me an impossible dream of a college education. A Jewish man, Lawrence Frankel, pulled him off the street after his high school classes each day and taught him gymnastics and tumbling.

It was during WWII where God brought dramatic changes to his life. Trained as a paratrooper, he was scheduled to head to the Normandy invasion. Within a few days of leaving, he was transferred to Camp Mackall, NC to teach hand-to-hand combat. While serving there he met a beautiful brown-eyed woman, as he put it. He related, She was a hostess in a canteen set up by the churches at Concord, NC.

Margaret Elizabeth Harris was a pure and beautiful Christian. I had never met a girl quite like her and I fell in love. Shortly after meeting her, I was sent overseas and she promised to marry me when the war was over. Joe served in the Philippines and then occupied Japan before returning to NC and marrying on March 20, 1946. Margaret was a vital key in my salvation through her prayers and Godly life. At the age of 25 he came to Christ.

Though his parents only had a third and eighth-grade education, through the influence of a number of people, his long held dream of a college education came to be. The young couple moved to Wilmore, KY in 1947 where he enrolled in Asbury College.

He began his teaching career at the same time training students in gymnastics and tumbling part time in the Phys. Ed. Department as a freshman. These were wonderful but busy years as he completed college in three years, worked three part time jobs, went to school full time and became a father. Patricia (Patti) was born in 1947 and Elizabeth (Kay) in 1950. He graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1950 and continued teaching part time as a graduate assistant until he became a full time professor in 1952. Margaret Jo (Jody) was born in 1953 and Joseph Allen (Joe) in 1955.

For the next 33 years he was a full time faculty member teaching history, geography, political science, sociology, economics and physical education. In 1950, he began taking students to churches, schools and other venues during breaks to do tumbling exhibitions as a means to share their testimonies. The college Jym Jamboree had been suspended during the war but Joe had restarted it in 1948 and appeared in it, often as a clown, for over 40 years.

He served as chair of the Social Science Division from 1968 to 1983. Under his leadership programs, minors or majors were started in Business Management and Accounting, Political Science, Economics, Social Work, Social Studies-Secondary Education and Cross-Cultural Communications. For 23 years, he annually took students to Washington for the Federal Seminar and to visit legislators’ offices. He also took students to Frankfort and influencing many into public service careers.

Outside the classroom, he served the college in many ways including being the first faculty chair of the discipline committee where he served with a just but loving spirit. When the committee dismissed a student for drinking,Joe learned that the student’s parent’s marriage had been destroyed by the father’s alcoholism. Joe drove 30 miles to counsel and console the mother and the student. His intervention ultimately led to the student returning to finish his degree, go to seminary, pastor his whole career and receive the college’s ‘A’ Award. Following Joe’s retirement from the classroom, he continued to work as a volunteer, counseling and encouraging foreign students and missionary kids. The bishop of a church in East Africa related that the only reason he survived his first year at Asbury was that Joe prayed with him weekly and encouraged him.

Joe was loved and loved others and was involved in many areas of community service. He served as a den ‘mother’ in the Cub Scouts, a Scout Master, on the Board of the ilmore United Methodist Church, a member and leader in the Lions Club, the Jessamine County Planning and Zoning Commission, the Jessamine County Citizen’s Board, Jessamine County Community Action and the Bluegrass Administrative District.

He was Mayor of Wilmore during a difficult and tumultuous time as the town installed its first sewer system. Even doing the project was a divisive issue and there were many grievances as people’s property was disturbed. Joe led and handled the turmoil with fairness and conspicuous grace.

Joe loved the Lord and wanted others to love him as well. He served on the board of the Wilmore Camp Meeting for 34 years. He was Vice President for 5 years and President for 17. He was Vice President or President of Aliceton Camp Meeting for 17 years where he did everything from digging ditches to preaching. He preached or was the youth director at 8 other camp meetings, pastored country churches for eight years and preached more than 100 revival meetings.

After he retired, he served as the College Centennial Historian and wrote the history of the school, ‘Asbury College: Vision and Miracle’. He went on multiple mission trips up into his eighties and was featured in the Jessamine Journal with pictures of him doing a back flip off a diving board at age 80.

Joe received many honors. Among them was the naming of ‘Thacker Drive’ in Wilmore for his service to the city. Asbury College (now Asbury University) named one of their student apartment complexes ‘Thacker House’. He was named a ‘Kentucky Colonel multiple times. The City of Wilmore declared February 13th ‘Joseph A. Thacker Day’ on his 90th birthday.

People described him as ‘people oriented’, ‘community minded’, ‘a great sense of humor and common sense’, ‘deeply loyal’, ‘an indomitable spirit’, ‘at heart a pastor’, ‘a servant leader’, ‘compassionate’, ‘a prayer warrior’, ‘he practiced what he preached’ and ‘he was involved in virtually all positive development in the college and the community.’

He was a loving and proud ‘Papaw’ to his 13 grandchildren:

Nathan, David and Michael Smythe. Susan Smythe Robertson

Micah and Elise Howerton and Krissi Howerton Berryhill

Jason Stevens, Jessica Stevens Williamson and Stacy Stevens Hall

Joseph Allen Thacker IV, Brad and Brian Cunningham and 13 great-grandchildren.

Those whose lives he touched are invite

Funeral Information

11:00 AM Till Service time Tuesday, Wilmore United Methodist Church

1:00 P.M. Tuesday, Wilmore United Methodist Church

Wimore Cemetery