We mourn the passing of Retired J.W. Charlie Snelson, who was 85 years old, and had been a member of Local 569 for over 48 years.
As a young man, Brother Snelson majored in electrical engineering at the prestigious Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. Then he entered the U.S. Navy, where he served our country for eight years, where he operated and maintained radar systems. With this extensive experience, in 1967, he applied to Local 569 as a Marine Fire Control Mechanic, and was immediately hired by Ets-Hokin & Galvan as a Journeyman Marine. After spending four years at Ets-Hokin, he would be dispatched to companies such as: Blackhawk, Universal Electric, Bingham, S.D.G.&E., and Saturn Electric. In late 1978, Charlie was dispatched to Southland Electric, where he’d work for the next 14 years. He continued to pay his dues for the next 6 years, before fully retiring in 1998.
Charlie will be remembered well, for there are many (as young apprentices) who were mentored by him. His care and concern even expanded outside of the workplace, as experience by at least one of his ‘students’. We were told that Charlie spotted one of his ‘charges’ after work, with car trouble. Charlie immediately stopped to help one of ‘his’ apprentices. He was “that kind of guy”, and he will be missed.
Services will be at 11:00 am, on Tues., Dec. 6th, at the Anderson-Ragsdale Mortuary, 5050 Federal Blvd., San Diego, CA 92102.
