William Rogers Obituary (1932 – 2021) – Rock Hill, SC

William “Bill” Rogers
July 28, 1932 – November 10, 2021
Rock Hill, South Carolina – William Allen Rogers, Jr., 89, known as Bill to many and Daddy to four, died Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021 at Atrium Health Main, Charlotte, NC.
Bill was born July 28, 1932, in the back bedroom of his parents’ house on Lawyers Lane in Columbus, Ga. He graduated from Columbus High School in Columbus, Ga., in 1949, where he answered to the nickname of Jughead, later converted to Jugbob by his own volition. He received a bachelor’s degree in forestry from Alabama Polytechnic in 1954, before that fine institution lost some of its luster when it became known as Auburn University. He rounded out his education with a master’s degree in Logging Engineering from Louisiana State University in 1971. His outstanding grades earned him membership into the Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society.
He put all that education to work for 41 years at International Paper Co., where he performed a number of jobs: foreman on the company job running the Bush Combines, draining – or at least attempting to drain – assigned swamps in Southern Alabama; overseeing wood chip purchases in Georgetown, SC, and finally, running the chip quality control business for IP from Dallas, Texas.
He is preceded in death by his parents, William Allen Rogers, Sr., and Lonell Funderburk Rogers, an infant sister, his wife of 62 years, Mary B. Rogers, and grandson, Clay Alexander Moye.
His survivors include his brother, Don Edwin Rogers, and his wife, Annie, of Norcross, Ga., first born, Robyn Norvell, and her husband, T.C., of Sterling, Alaska; his Little Soldier, Ruth Ann Moye (Rikki), and her husband, Mitch, of Tulsa, Okla.; an only son, Allen Rogers, and his wife, Denee, of Georgetown, SC; and his roommate of 10 years and youngest daughter, Mary Alice Rogers, of Rock Hill, SC, two grandchildren and five great grandchildren.
Bill was a giant presence in the lives of his family. While he mellowed into a gentle soul who counseled patience, planning and reason, his formative years were filled with what he would later consider youthful indiscretions involving a jaunt in dirt track racing, a trip to the Daytona 500 when the race was run on the beach and Highway A1A, and a summer jumping out of airplanes to fight fires in Montana the year he turned 21, and oh so much more.
He would win the two races he entered and retire undefeated. His brother saw him win a $25 cash prize at one of those races, and Bill made him swear not to tell their parents. He would inform his parents of his Florida trip with a simple note stating Gone to Daytona left on the breakfast room table. We don’t know if the end of that race featured the fireworks common at the end of today’s NASCAR races, but guaranteed, Lonell Rogers greeted his return with her own display, and it was not pretty. A similar display was ignited his smokejumper summer when his mother refused to sign the papers to send her 20-year-old son to Mizzoula, and he informed her, “Those papers have been gone for a week. The old man already signed them.” Bill had a great summer. The same could not be said of his father.
Later in life, with four children to feed and a wife working overnight hours as a labor-and-delivery nurse, he took on the mantle of chef. He was not particularly good at it. The family would have pot roast, rice and gravy one night – all prepared by Mary — and the leftovers the next night. The menu then was hot dogs. Family lore has it that he eventually put the hot dogs in Minute Rice, thus was born the legend of Wienees and Rice. We don’t recommend it.
As the sharp corners of his life softened with age, he became a bit of a play toy and an accepting soft target for gentle ribbing by various family members. In his closet is an extensive collection of the most obnoxious Hawaiian shirts available in stores and on the internet, lovingly purchased, wrapped and gifted to him on pretty much every Father’s Day by his two Parrothead daughters. One standout features dancing bananas, which would become his trademark uniform on the last day of quality control and statistic classes he conducted for IP. And because Daddy loved a good counterpunch, he showed up in that appalling shirt and matching vivid red shorts at Rikki’s wedding rehearsal dinner. She was suitably horrified.
He would become a bit of a Parrothead, too. Making the mistake of stating, “Next time I’m going,” when being regaled with Buffett concert stories. He got his wish for his 75th birthday. He was the hit of the tailgate party as the Ancient Land Shark, complete with a massive, stuffed shark fin protruding from his back and a bright blue parrot festooned to his cowboy hat. He was in high demand for pictures with total strangers who made their way to see the Old Guy with the Fin.
He was a poetry lover. When asked by his daddy why he liked poetry so much, he said, “Prose paints a picture. Poetry paints a feeling.” And the poems he committed to memory! As a Rudyard Kipling fan, he memorized Gunga Din, The Ballad of East and West and The Ballad of The British Soldier, among others. He memorized Robert Service poems and relished in reeling off The Cremation of Sam McGee in his South Georgia drawl to the fascination of his listeners. He was a T.S. Eliot fan and not only read Cats, but saw the musical multiple times.
Although he preferred poetry, he was an avid book collector and reader as evidenced by the numerous bulging bookcases in his house. He loved Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows, because Toad was so cheeky; Robert Ruark’s The Old Man and The Boy; Larry McMurtry’s Lonesome Dove, because Gus McCrae and Woodrow Call were so completely different but the very best of friends; Ben Greene’s The Horse Trader; J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter; Jim Corbett’s The Tiger Hunter, My India and Jungle Lore; Henry Beston’s The Outtermost House; every book by James Herriot, and more. He even read Shakespeare — for fun — and would quote long passages of MacBeth. He was especially fond of the short story, Stubby Pringle’s Christmas, by Jack Shaefer. Do yourself and your family a favor this year and read it aloud on Christmas Eve and think of Bill.
In lieu of flowers, he requested donations in his memory to The Salvation Army. He also would have been pleased with donations in his honor to Lansford Canal State Park in Chester, SC. “I like to go in the fall and winter when nobody’s out there. It’s like it’s my own park.”
The best way to honor this giant of man is to take a walk in the woods. Get away from the chaos of life and enjoy the beauty and calmness of nature. He would be especially happy if you took along a treasured four-legger on your amble. He measured his quality of life by his ability to take care of his business and to take his dogs to Lansford Canal.
With 89 years of time with him, there’s too much to share to give you an idea of his life. Managing this firehose of memories is difficult at best. When he started to take short, choppy steps and whistle without whistling, it was best to get out of his way. He loved hiking in Colorado with brother, treasured trips to Alaska with his eldest daughter as guide, running endless pass routes with his son in the long strip of grass beside their house in Alabama, and football games, fly fishing and brisket with his youngest, seeing his children grow and succeed. And, and, and…
He would quote Lonesome Dove at a time like this, stating, “Nothing to do but mount up and ride on.” And while he is correct, it is with an at times numbing sadness and emptiness that we will ride on, but we will find comfort in the knowledge that best remedy of that feeling is a trip to the park in the winter and fall with a rowdy pack of noisy dogs as companions.