Dr. Jack's patients would hear him whistling gospel hymns long before he rang their door bells.
"He would go see all the home-bound patients," said Jean Bowen of Suwanee, who worked for Dr. Jack nearly 30 years. "He would take their blood pressure and listen to their heart and lungs. He cheered them up more than anything else."
For decades, Dr. John Marvel Schreeder practiced medicine in Chamblee. Call him a country doctor. He visited shut-ins and home-bound patients across north DeKalb County. He delivered babies at Crawford Long Hospital, Georgia Baptist Medical Center and DeKalb General.
"He was proud of the fact that he was a sole practitioner who did house calls, who went to see his patients," said a nephew, Rick Logan of Tucker. "He took great pride in that."
On June 17, Dr. Jack died of natural causes at Laurel Baye Health Care of Lake Lanier in Buford. He was 93. A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. today at Chamblee First United Methodist Church. A.S. Turner & Sons is in charge of arrangements.
Born in Haverstraw, N.Y., the doctor moved with his family to Atlanta in 1933. He earned a public health engineering degree at Georgia Tech, and on Christmas Eve 1940 married his first wife, the late Dee Stevens Schreeder.
He served in the Army during World War II as part of campaigns in the Mediterranean and European theaters. He was awarded the Bronze Star and the French War Cross.
In late-1940s, he entered Emory University Medical School and completed his residency at Grady Memorial Hospital and Lawson General Hospital. He joined a group of family doctors in Chamblee that was headed up by the late Dr. W.A. Mendenhall.
In DeKalb, it was a period of hustle and bustle. People were returning home from the war. General Motors operated its Doraville plant. Dr. Jack, an avid gardener, kept busy.
"I wouldn't say that being a doctor made him wealthy, but it made him comfortable," his nephew said. "He simply cared for people."
His office was off Chamblee-Dunwoody Road, next to Chamblee High, where he was the team doctor for the school's football team and a sideline fixture. So was "Cham" the English bulldog he owned that served as school mascot. Cheerleaders would fetch Cham from the house and take him to the field on game nights.
Dr. Jack wore a suit and fancied bow ties because they didn't get in the way of providing care. He drove a Volkswagen bug on rounds; his favorite hymn to whistle was "The Old Rugged Cross."
"Oh goodness yes," Mrs. Bowen said. "He would start whistling when he got out the car and grabbed his doctor's bag."
Dr. Jack didn't have any children, but he and his first wife opened up their home as foster parents, said niece Betty Parker of Marietta.
"Some stayed for a summer and some stayed for years," she said. "They took care of those kids as if they were their own."
Additional survivors include his wife, Mamie L. Schreeder of Loganville; and a sister, Margaret Schreeder Ryder of Doraville.
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