Sammie Smith Jr., 75, died Wednesday, April 18, 2018, at his home in Abbeville, Mississippi. The funeral service will be held Tuesday, April 24, 2018, at 11 a.m. in the Chapel of Waller Funeral Home. Burial will follow at Eastover Memorial Cemetery.  Visitation will be held beginning at 10 a.m. prior to the service at the funeral home.

Born March 24, 1943, to the late Sammie and Relda Westbrook Smith, Mr. Smith was a graduate of Louisiana State University and began his career as a chemical engineer with the USDA the day after he graduated, holding this same position until the day he retired.

He was an avid hunter and fisherman in his younger days. As he grew older, his compassion and love of animals replaced his desire to hunt and fish.

He was an active member of St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church and truly loved the Lord and his church. Along with his parents, he was preceded in death by his wife, Frances Breaux Smith.

Sammie was a loving and devoted husband and father and is survived by his daughter, Angela Smith Jones and her husband, Scott of Oxford; sons, Kenneth W. Smith and his wife, Leslie of Pueblo, Colorado and Ray Hoffpauir and his wife Suman, of Leawood, Kansas; sister, Pam Purdue and her husband, Larry of Baton Rouge, Louisiana; nine grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

Memorial contributions in Mr. Smith’s memory may be made to St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church, 416 South Fifth Street, Oxford, MS, Oxford-Lafayette Humane Society, 413 McElroy, Oxford, MS 38655 or St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, 262 Danny Thomas Place, Memphis, TN 38105.

For further information, you may visit www.wallerfuneralhome.com.