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Joyce Amacher
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Vera Joyce Amacher, Dunwoody GA - passed away peacefully Sunday, February 26th at her home in Dunwoody at the age of 84.
Joyce
was born on November 28, 1932 in Atlanta, GA to the late Emmett and
Louis McClellan. She was a graduate of West Fulton High School where
she was a star of the theater program. She attended the Crawford Long
School of Nursing and enjoyed a career in pediatric nursing.
Joyce
married William C. Amacher on December 11, 1965. Joyce and Bill moved
to Dunwoody in 1968 and she became active in the Dunwoody community.
Joyce was an involved member of the Dunwoody United Methodist Church and
served for many years on the Altar Guild and was a member of the
Crusaders Sunday School class.
Joyce had a passion
for flowers and was a master floral designer. Many referred to her as a
professional volunteer. She was a member and officer of many
organizations including Dunwoody Garden Club, Dunwoody Homeowners
Association, and Dunwoody Preservation Trust. Notable achievements she
spearheaded would be the “Fight to Save Dunwoody” in the late 1970s, an
effort to maintain the architectural integrity of the Dunwoody
Community, Committee member of the first Dunwoody July 4th Parade and
later Grand Marshall, the Ashford Dunwoody Road Beautification Project,
the Replant the Dunwoody Forest, where 20,000 trees were replanted after
a devastating tornado, creating Dunwoody Lemonade Days at Brook Run
Park, and Co-Chairing the efforts to save the Dunwoody Farm House from
demolition and many, many more.
Joyce was a devoted wife, loving mother, and sweet grandmother.
Joyce
Amacher is survived by her faithful husband, William C. Amacher, a
sister Brenda (Johnny) Hardrick, children Zerah (Bob) Wilson, Zelda
(Dixon) Patrick, and Zack (Amie) Amacher, grandchildren Samantha,
Brenda, Lauren, Elliott, Allison, and Kimberly.
A Memorial
Service will be held on Saturday, March 4th at 10:30 am in the
Sanctuary of Dunwoody United Methodist Church. Service will be led by
Reverend B. Wiley Stephens, with a reception to follow.
In
lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Dunwoody Garden Club,
Joyce Amacher Fund, c/o Donna Burt, 2772 Joel Place, Dunwoody, GA 30360.
The
Dunwoody Crier had a great overview of what Joyce meant to Dunwoody and I would like to share it below.
A stalwart in Dunwoody history, Joyce Amacher, has died at age 84.
Mrs. Amacher’s footprints are in just about every part of the city -
from the Dunwoody Farmhouse, the wooded median on Ashford Dunwoody Road,
the spring festival called Lemonade Days and the mammoth effort to
re-plant the city after the tornado of 1998.
Vera Joyce McClellan
Amacher died peacefully Sunday at her Dunwoody home, a year after
doctors told her pancreatic cancer had returned. She also suffered from
dementia. The native Atlantan was born in 1932 in Atlanta and
married Bill Amacher in 1965. She worked with him in his construction
and real estate ventures, but was known for her community efforts.
As
Dunwoody grew from farmland to a peaceful bedroom suburb to the large
edge city that included Perimeter Center, Amacher’s influence was felt
through the Dunwoody Homeowners’ Association and its spin off, the
Dunwoody Preservation Trust.
When Perimeter Mall was being
developed, according to longtime friend Bill Robinson, Amacher
approached the developers with her plans to place a median in the
expanded Ashford Dunwoody Road and plant trees there. Most of them stand
today in what has become a major part of metro Atlanta.
Her best
known effort was the long campaign to Save the Dunwoody Farmhouse. With
partner Lynne Byrd, Amacher led the Dunwoody Preservation Trust in
community-wide fundraising to preserve the Cheek-Spruill Farmhouse at
Mt. Vernon and Chamblee Dunwoody Roads.
The effort resulted in
enough money to save the house from commercial development and a deal
was cut with a shopping center developer to give up the Cheek-Spruill
barn, but build a small shopping center around the house itself. The
farmhouse is now the chief landmark of residential Dunwoody and a
reminder of its rural past less than 100 years ago.
When a
devastating tornado struck Dunwoody in April 1998, damaging 3000 homes
and destroying nearly 1000, Amacher went into action. She formed an
organization she called Replant the Dunwoody Forest. Hers was not to be a
minor beautification project.
More than 25,000 trees were
distributed and planted throughout the city. Brook Run Park became a
major distribution center for trucks, trees, seedlings and volunteers.
The operation, with donations cajoled by Amacher from throughout the
state, became a sight-seeing event. One newspaperman wrote that Amacher
and Byrd could run just about any Fortune 500 company.
“No one has done more for Dunwoody than Joyce Amacher,” said state Rep. Fran Millar (R-Dunwoody).
Mayor Denis Shortal stressed her love of flowers and her two terms as president of the Dunwoody Garden Club. “If she saw a bare space of land, she would start to plant flowers there,” he said.
To
carry on the fund-raising, Amacher and her committee decided to “make
lemons out of lemonade.” What is now the four-day festival and carnival
in Brook Run Park began as a modest 5k-run and an afternoon of crafts
and sweet snacks.
The proceeds from Lemonade Days now support the
Farmhouse, the renovation of the Donaldson-Bannister Farmhouse at
Chamblee Dunwoody and Vermack Roads and many smaller events from
lectures to the placing of three Dunwoody homes on the National Register
of Historic Places. Until recent years, Amacher’s sense of Dunwoody’s heritage was a resource to the work of the Homeowners’ Association.
Amacher
is survived by her husband, sister Brenda Hardrick, daughters Zerah
Wilson and Zelda Patrick and son Zachary. She leaves six grandchildren
and a sister-in-law, Ramona Amacher, and many nieces and nephews.
A
memorial service will be held Saturday, March 4, at 10:30 a.m. in the
sanctuary of Dunwoody United Methodist Church, with a reception
following in the Fellowship Hall.
