Obituary: Billy Joe Herman, Sr.

Billy Joe Herman, Sr., “Strang”, 71, of Saulsbury, passed away on Wednesday, June 5, 2024, at Jackson-Madison County General Hospital.

He was born in Wichita, Kansas, on Monday, January 5, 1953, son of the late George Michael Herman and Ruth Bernice Campbell Herman. Everyone called him “Strang”, a name that Randel Porterfield gave him many years ago as a young man. He worked for Boyd Ervin in Bolivar until moving to Walnut, Mississippi to work on Norcross Farms until he once again moved to Saulsbury and bought an old house on Mississippi Road in 2008. Mr. Herman began working for Boyd Ervin again at his Grand Junction feed store until he retired and worked cutting yards in his community. In harvest time, you could find Bill on a tractor for Greg Smith, cutting cotton every year. He was a strong, hardworking man who taught each of his grandchildren to drive his old trucks. Mr. Herman loved being a grandfather more than anything and each of them made him a better man. His passion in his older life was cutting yards and talking to and about his grandkids, his granddaughter the doctor and his grandson the soldier; his granddaughter the businesswoman; his grandson the contractor; and his youngest grandson, who is working at the town feed store, who makes him so proud, still in school and always hard at it.

The life of Bill Herman has been full. He has been to Hawaii with his daughter and her military husband as well as many military travels. Gone but not forgotten.

Memorial service was was at Shackelford Funeral Directors chapel on Saturday, June 8, 2024, at 3 p.m. in Middleton.

Bill leaves behind a daughter, Windy Kay Powers of  Walnut, Mississippi; son, Billy Herman, Jr. of Saulsbury; granddaughter, Samantha Kay Powers Rowlette of Ft. Bragg, North Carolina; grandson, Casey Rowlette of Ft. Bragg, North Carolina; granddaughter, Shelbie Kalynn Powers of Houston, Texas; grandson, Shawn Michael Powers, and his wife, Samantha Carroll-Powers, of San  Antonio, Texas; grandson, Steven Matthew Powers of Walnut, Mississippi; and four great grandchildren, Owen James, Alonna Kay, Stella Jolene Rowlette, Steven Michael Powers, and Kylie Carroll. Additionally, he leaves his siblings, Tommy Herman of Whiteville and Jimmy Herman of Selmer.