Jimmie Lee Alexander, age 84, passed away on March 8, 2024, at Ridgeview Health Services in Jasper, Alabama.Funeral services will be held Monday, March 11, 2024, at 1pm at Sixth Avenue Church of Christ in Jasper. Levi Sides will officiate. The family will receive friends beforehand beginning at 11am. The church will host a dessert fellowship with the family after the service for all in attendance.
Pallbearers will be Mike Gilbert, Rusty Gilbert, Ray Gurganus, Roger Wilson, Phillip Horton, Gene Hyche, Danny Gurganus, and Jonathan Jordan. Honorary pallbearers are Jerry (Jake) Morrow, his former students, and the Sixth Avenue elders and deacons.
A lifelong resident of Walker County, Jimmie Lee was born September 15, 1939, in Cordova. He graduated from Cordova High School in 1956 and from Florence State Teachers College (UNA) in 1960. His first job was as a science teacher and three-sport coach at Sipsey Jr. High. From 1963 to 1967, he was at Central Jr. High in Jasper, where he coached five sports. Central students affectionately dubbed him “Coach A,” a name he was known by from then on.
Coach A continued his teaching and coaching career at three county high schools: Dora, Oakman, and Cordova. He concluded thirteen years in public education in 1973, serving his alma mater as biology and chemistry teacher, assistant football coach, and head basketball coach.
On March 7, 1970, Jimmie Lee married fellow Cordova High graduate Carol Berzette, who was by his side on their 54th wedding anniversary and at his death the next day from complications of Alzheimer’s.
Family, church, and young people were Jim’s priorities. After his first child was born, he left his career in education to better support his growing family. After a brief stint in the insurance business, he established a long career in the mining industry, working first with Drummond Coal Company. In 1979, now with a second child, he hired on with Taft Coal, where he retired in 2004 as vice president for reclamation and safety.
Jim valued service to his community. He served Cordova as city councilman and mayor in the 1970s, and the Cordova church of Christ as Bible teacher and elder. After the family moved to Jasper in the 1980s, he served for decades as an elder and teacher at Sixth Avenue church of Christ. The teens were his favorite Bible students.
Jimmie Lee loved to lead congregational singing, and he equally enjoyed performing gospel quartet numbers with three of his first cousins. His beautiful bass voice was also heard with the Men’s Chorale; he was mistaken for Johnny Cash by more than one audience member.
In 2005, Jasper City Schools asked Jim to serve as director of athletics. He poured himself into this new role for the next decade, thrilled to be back in education. By this time, he was grandfather to two girls, whose activities he faithfully followed as “Grandad.” By 2015, he was also grandfather to two boys, who were present when Grandad stood on the fifty yard line to be honored by the community at the start of his final retirement.
Jimmie Lee is preceded in death by his father and mother, Elbert Theodore and Jessie Mae Key Alexander; sister and brother-in-law Anita Alexander and Arthur Lee Pate; mother-in-law Bobbie Nell Reed Salter; sister-in-law Brenda Kaye Berzette; and father-in-law Ernest Rowe Berzette.
He is survived by his wife Carol Berzette Alexander; daughter Amie Kaye Alexander Hardin (John); son Brian Lee Alexander (Kristi); grandchildren Abbie Kaye Hardin, Maggie Alexander Hardin, Reed Ingle Alexander, and Brodie Lee Alexander; brother-in-law Ernie Berzette (Sheryl); and nieces and nephews.
The family wishes to thank these special caregivers: Water Oak Villa, Dr. Ike Baker, Walker Baptist Medical Center, Ridgeview Health Services, Southeast Hospice, and sitters Susie Gilbert, Ruby Brown, Renee Lawson, and Naquito Gibson.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations to the Sixth Avenue church of Christ youth group or the Walker Area Community Foundation.
Sixth Avenue Church of Christ – 1501 6th Ave S, Jasper, 35501
Walker Area Community Foundation – P.O. Box 171, Jasper, 35502
