Jac Chambliss was a man of many interests and of impressive intellect. He was an attorney, a civic leader, an author, a passionate proponent of fair government, a patriot in the best sense of the word, and a man devoted to his family, to his faith and to his community. His death Tuesday at 99 leaves Chattanooga the poorer for his passing.
Mr. Chambliss -- Jac was an acronym for his given names -- probably was best known as an attorney, but his concerns were so varied, his civic involvement so expansive and his zeal for life so great that it is difficult to make that statement with certainty. It is possible, for example, that more people knew him as a result of the columns wrote for this and other Chattanooga newspapers over the course of more than half a century than for his long service to the legal profession.
Born in 1910, Mr. Chambliss was a member of a family in which dedication to the law, to public service and to civic and political leadership was taken for granted. Mr. Chambliss willingly assumed that mantle. He attended the Webb School of Bell Buckle, the Virginia Military Institute, Rhodes (formerly Southwestern) College and the Cumberland University Law School. Following graduation from the latter in 1932, he began his legal practice in a firm that bore his family name. He never left that practice.
Mr. Chambliss continued to offer legal advice and counsel until shortly before his death. His involvement in a variety of other endeavors continued late into life as well. Many of his civic and community associations are well known, but his involvement in others, often by his choice, were not highly publicized.
He was, for example, active in the founding of the St. Barnabas Nursing Home. He was an active member of the YMCA for years and served as its president for several terms. His served, too, on many corporate boards and was a fixture on the governing bodies of various civic, social service and religious agencies in the community.
Mr. Chambliss was a gunnery officer in the South Pacific during World War II and believed passionately in the democratic vision of America. He was instrumental in the creation of the Citizens Good Government League here in the years immediately after the war. He and other veterans worked diligently through that organization to end control of local government by political machines. He counted that group's success as one of his proudest accomplishments.
Mr. Chambliss was a man of many public accomplishments. In his more private moments, he was an inveterate traveler, a poet, a musician and a raconteur of renown. His contributions to the community were immense, and all he served so long and so well should join his family in mourning his death.