Funeral service for Alvie “Sonny” Powell, age 82, of Scottsboro, is Friday, June 7, 2024, at 2 pm at Cullman Funeral Home chapel, with Rev. Steve Rodgers and Bro. Larry Brown officiating. Visitation will be held Thursday, June 6, 2024, from 6-8 pm at the funeral home. Mr. Powell will lie in state on Friday from 12-2 pm and interment will be held at Mt. Zion Cemetery in Vinemont.
Cullman Funeral Home is honored to serve the family.
Mr. Powell was born February 25, 1942, to Alvie J. Powell and Annie Stewart Powell. He passed from this life on Sunday, June 2, 2024.
He was preceded in death by his parents; brothers, James Ellis, Robert Ellis and wife, Elvern, Ray Ellis and wife, Hazel, Billy Powell and wife, Lorene, Ronald Powell; sisters, Marie Kelso and husband Leon, and Allene Thompson.
He is survived by brother, Jack Powell and wife Geraldine; a host of nieces, nephews, and cousins and friends and family at Volunteers of America.
Below written by Kathy Blackmon, Sonny’s niece:
You just seem to think that some people will live forever…and Uncle Sonny (Alvie Powell) will forever be young and in our hearts as he has moved on to Heaven in the early morning hours today. He’s always been a part of my life. He was born 2/25/1942 and my grandmother was told he was a “blue baby” (something comparable to what we now know as Cerebral Palsy) and that he would not live more than 12 to 14 years – GOD had other plans. My Grandma Powell kept him in her home until her passing in 1998 and THEY took care of each other for over 50 years. She sheltered and protected him from any hurt that she felt society would bring his way and he helped to care for her until her passing. Sonny couldn’t speak plain and had the mind of a child – so innocent and playful- but he was very high functioning and loved with all of his heart.
He would play with all of us grandkids, and our kids, as long as we would play. He loved his model cars and would drive them around and around the kitchen table for hours. He loved his radio and listening to country music. He had several “old cars” over the years that he would drive back and forth over the yard and up and down the driveway – he never had a driver’s license because he couldn’t read or write due to not being able to function in school. But his ability to overcome and do what he set his mind to outshined it all. And those cars…they were clean and shined like new when he put his touch on them. He had such an imagination that once he painted a minnow bucket red and turned it upside down and glued it to the top of his old car and it was his POLICE CAR. And if you knew him, you knew he had an imagination beyond compare!!!
He had what was once labeled as “color personality” by one of his doctors. If he wore all denim, he was a cowboy. All black, and he was an outlaw. All navy blue, he was a policeman. All khaki, he was in the Army. All white, he was in the Navy. And he was always BOSS!
He loved to be outside year-round – and spent most afternoons sitting on the porch or in the yard waving at anyone who drove by. And if you took the time to talk to him, then YOU were his COUSIN for life.
