LAWRENCEVILLE: Stephen Bobb, gentle dog lover, hard worker

Among the temporary jobs Stephen Bobb held, he especially enjoyed being a bell ringer for the Salvation Army.

In recent years, he would raise money for the nonprofit by manning a kettle in the weeks before Christmas in front of a Wal-Mart or Kroger near his home in Lawrenceville. He would bring in quite a bit of change during his hours on the job, said Capt. Bobby Westmoreland of the Gwinnett Salvation Army.

“He was a good, good-hearted person and conscientious with his job,” said Capt. Westmoreland. “He would smile at people and I think they could see that he was a genuinely kind and nice man.”

Mr. Bobb, 49, died Sunday of pneumonia at his home in Lawrenceville. The funeral is 2 p.m. today at the Snellville Chapel of Tom M. Wages Funeral Home, which is in charge of arrangements.

Mr. Bobb grew up in downtown Snellville, the youngest of five children. His father, the late Frances Bobb, was the first police officer, firefighter and water works employee of the city of Snellville, said Delores Fair of Brookhaven, Stephen Bobb’s sister.

“My dad never slept,” she said. “He was always working.”

After their parents divorced, Stephen Bobb dropped out of high school so he could help support himself and his mother, Mrs. Fair said.

In his late teens, Mr. Bobb was diagnosed with schizophrenia, a severe and disabling mental disorder. He took medication but his illness wasn’t always under control, said his brother-in-law, Jack Mobley of Douglasville.

As a result, he received government disability assistance and worked as a day laborer.

“Every morning he would get up at 4 a.m. and stand in line to try to get picked for a job. He would clean up construction sites, that kind of thing,” said his sister. “He tried so hard to make a living.”

Mr. Bobb was a gentle spirit who took in stray dogs. More than once, he went without heat in his apartment because he spent his money on dog food rather than his heating bill, his sister said. Recently, however, he received aid from Daffy’s Pet Soup Kitchen in Lawrenceville, a pet food bank, she said.

Mr. Bobb loved adventure movies like “Indiana Jones” and regularly attended a Methodist church, his sister said.

Additional survivors include his mother, Juliette Bobb of Lawrenceville; two sisters, Linda Mobley of Douglasville and Dida Spicer of Cumming; and a brother, Paul Bobb of Cumming.