Tally Ho! Joe Stewart!

Joe and Rachel Stewart

A good friend of mine died last week.  Joe Stewart.  Joe and I have never met face to face.  But we knew each other well by our emails and blogs.  His blog was Talley Ho and mine is Chicken-fat.  Before Joe,  I communicated with his brother Bhob Stewart for years.  Bhob was a critic, sometimes TV Guide reviewer, and sometimes editor and compiler of books about comicbooks.  About 1990 or so Bhob and I locked horns over the facts and stats of MAD comic book.  Over the years Bhob developed a friendship, then somehow his brother Joe Stewart joined.  He and I discovered we both were obsessed  with, the South, Ragtime and blues fans, and both were crazy, if not obsessive,  over the New Orleans street band TUBA SKINNY.

Bhob Stewart

Three years ago Bhob Stewart died.  The next day Joe's wife Rachel died.  It was almost more than Joe could take.  In his blog he loved to show pictures of he and Rachel together on trips.  I think that helped get him through the painful time of accepting her death.  I believe their children helped him get back into life as well.

As you will read below, Joe died three years to the day after Rachel left this earth.  Joe was about 80.

Life is short.

Below is the email I received announcing Joe's  death:

If you knew Bhob Stewart then you've heard stories over the years about his younger, taller, and equally handsome brother Joe. And if you were lucky then you met him at one point or another and heard his fascinating stories about growing up in the deep south in the 1950s, hanging out with Bob Dylan at Mardi Gras in 1964, arranging the Corcoran Gallery exhibition of underground comic art in 1969, and and keeping up with the world of the jazz and blues -- he shared Bhob's rich voice and gifts as a raconteur in the great Southern tradition.  The voice is now gone, but you can still read the stories at his blog, Tally Ho!.

Joe passed away on March 8, 2017, three years to the day after he lost his wife Rachel. He went peacefully, surrounded by family. There will be a jazz funeral this weekend, on March 18, 2017 at 1pm at the Cunningham Turch Funeral Home, 811 Cameron Street, Alexandria, VA. 

Joe