Robert (Bob) Stuart, 100, of Blacksburg Virginia, died Thursday, July 26th, 2018, peacefully and well cared for in his home at Showalter Center.
He was born May 28, 1918 in Madison WI, the son of Robert C. Stuart Sr. and Myrtle Walters Stuart. He finished high school in La Fayette, GA and attended North Georgia College and Emory University. In WWII he served on a destroyer (USS Doherty) stationed in the Bering Sea and on Nimitz’s staff in Hawaii.
Stuart, and his wife, Emily Cottingham Stuart, felt that this life was greatly shaped by the Great Depression, which was turbulent for both of their families.
They met hiking in Western North Carolina while attending the YM/YWCA southern student conference, which focused on the significance of religious ethics on southern problems of the 1930s, race, sharecropping and lack of jobs.
They courted in graduate school at UNC-Chapel Hill and married in 1946 returning to UNC-Chapel Hill where Bob earned his master’s degree in Regional Planning.
He served as Planning Director for the cities of Knoxville, Tennessee, Metropolitan Atlanta, and Evanston, Illinois and was associate director of the upstate New York Transportation Studies, as well as technical director for the Cleveland – Seven County Transportation and Land-Use Study.
He took special pride in the Atlanta Regional Planning and in development of the Blacksburg Transit System.
From 1969 to 1987 he taught Urban Planning at Virginia Tech. Since retirement he has been an active volunteer in a wide range of community activities and the Blacksburg Presbyterian Church.
He was preceded in death by his wife, Emily Cottingham Stuart, in June 2011.
Survivors include his two children, Daughter Mary Stuart (her husband, Michael Weinrich), son Rob (his wife, Barbara), Sam Austell (father of his grandchildren), three grandchildren, Andrew Austell, Elisa Austell, and Jesse Austell, and two great grandchildren, Elliott Austell and Reese Lee as well as many nieces, nephews, and cousins.
At Bob’s request there will not be a funeral service.
In lieu of flowers please consider a donation to the YMCA at Virginia Tech or to Warm Hearth. Arrangements by McCoy Funeral Home, Blacksburg.
