The day after Jack and Geneva Hood commemorated their 60th wedding anniversary, Jack Hood looked his wife squarely in the eyes and professed his love for her.
“I had this little thing I did every night,” Geneva Hood said. “I’d kiss him seven or eight times and tell him I loved him. He’d usually smile, but Friday he said, as clear as day, ‘I love you too.’ ”
That exchange was so memorable to Geneva Hood because her aging husband hadn’t said much of anything since experiencing a massive stroke in 2009. There were so many things they couldn’t have a conversation about, including the death of their only child, Sandra Hood White, last year.
But Jack Hood had something to say that Friday night. It was a perfect moment, Geneva Hood said.
The next day, July 13, Jack Hood of Cumming died from complications of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases. He was 86.
A funeral is planned for 11 a.m. Friday at McDonald and Son Funeral Home, Cumming, which is also in charge of arrangements. Burial at Gray Hill Cemetery, Commerce, will follow the service.
A native of Warren County and reared in neighboring Jefferson County, Hood graduated from high school and went straight into the Navy, said his eldest grandson, Shane White. It was in the Navy that Hood was introduced to the fire service, and once he was discharged the Atlanta fire department was a natural fit. Hood made the fire service his career for 30 years, family members said. By the time he retired in the late 1970s, he was a deputy chief in the department.
“He was a devoted, hard-nosed fireman,” said Forsyth County Fire Chief Danny Bowman, who used to be an Atlanta firefighter. “There were no limits to his integrity or bravery in the fire service.
Bowman said Hood’s promotion from captain to a battalion chief was deserved but not the easiest of adjustments for the veteran firefighter.
“As a chief, he was supposed to stay on the exterior, but every time we looked up he was trying to enter the structure,” Bowman said. “We liked to have thought we were going to have to chain him to his car to keep him on the exterior.”
Hood’s dedication to his career stemmed from his service in the Navy. It was a work ethic he couldn’t shake, and Hood would gladly lead the way into battle, Bowman said.
“He was concerned and cared about his men,” his grandson said. “He didn’t want to just send them into a risky situation; he wanted to be there with them. I think it would be hard to do that if he didn’t genuinely care.”
His last call, his wife said, was the 1978 Loew’s Grand Theater fire, and true to form, he didn’t stay on the exterior of the structure.
“If you had to sum up Jack Hood in a sentence,” Bowman said, “it would be, ‘We’ve got a job to do, boys. Let’s get to it.’”
In addition to his wife and eldest grandson, Hood is survived by two additional grandsons; and three great-grandchildren.
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