By all accounts, Jim Mallon was a great neighbor and loving husband and father who diligently cared for his bedridden wife and daughter in the Woodstock home where the family had lived for 25 years or longer.
Early Sunday, a fast-moving fire tore through the home, killing the 78-year-old Mallon and his wife, Carole, who was 77.
The retired couple’s adult daughter and her 25-year-old son were able to escape the blaze.
On Monday, neighbor Bob Rivers remembered his friend, who he said everyone in the neighborhood called “Mr. Jim.”
“He was a wonderful gentleman, a real sweetheart of a man,” said Rivers, 77
Rivers said he and his wife attended Woodstock First Baptist Church with the Mallons.
“He would roll his wife down in her wheelchair,” Rivers said. Carole Mallon suffered from Parkinson’s disease, Rivers said.
The Mallons also had a daughter who was bedridden, and her 25-year-old son also lived with them.
“Mr. Jim just had the weight of the world on his shoulders,” Rivers said. “But he was sure loyal to his wife.”
Another neighbor, who lives across the street from the Mallons, concurred with Rivers’ assessment, calling the couple “just the sweetest people ever.”
That neighbor, who didn’t want to give her name, told the AJC that Jim Mallon was already retired when she moved into the neighborhood 14 years ago.
But, she said, “he never quit going. He had little odd jobs here and there.”
“He worked at Steak and Shake for a while as a greeter,” she said. “The last few years, he’s mostly just taken care of his wife. He was very diligent to take care of her.”
Three firefighters were injured fighting the 1 a.m. blaze on Commons Court, in the Kingston Square subdivision within earshot of Dixie Speedway.
The injured firefighters, one from Woodstock and two from Cherokee County, were standing on the porch of the burning home when it collapsed. They were taken to Wellstar Kennestone Hospital in Marietta for treatment of minor injuries.
The cause of the fire has not been determined.
Staff writer George Mathis contributed to this article.
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