Coast high school says goodbye to bowtie-wearing history teacher who died of COVID-19
If it weren’t for Tom Slade, Austin Wallace probably wouldn’t have passed high school.
Wallace was one of about 100 people who lined the street outside Vancleave High School on Saturday morning to pay respects to Slade, a beloved history teacher who died of complications from COVID-19 on Sept. 6.
After Slade’s funeral service across the street at First Baptist Church of Vancleave, the procession drove down Bulldog Lane through the school’s campus.
Wallace, 18 and now an alumnus of Vancleave, showed up with a group of friends to honor Slade’s memory. Wallace had taken Slade’s United States history class as a junior.
“He’ll do anything for you,” Wallace said. “He helped me out a lot with my grades.”
As Slade’s funeral procession made its way down Bulldog Lane, community members stood outside their cars parked along the road. Some waved small American flags, remembering the man who was described at his funeral service as a combination of Ducky, the bowtie-wearing medical examiner on NCIS, and Mr. Rogers— always ready with a quirky joke and a listening ear.
Each of Slade’s pallbearers wore a Vancleave High School face mask and a bowtie from his personal collection.
Slade, who was also a graduate of Vancleave, started teaching at the school in 1991. He taught history, world civilizations and other social science classes. Students and alumni at the funeral procession said it was hard to imagine the school without him, even if they had never had him as a teacher.
“As you drove in, he was always waving at you,” said Tyler Simms, gesturing towards the spot where Slade had stood every morning.
“He stood right by my parking spot, and if I didn’t park straight, he’d make me park straight,” recalled recent graduate Derl Cole.
Everyone remembered the distinctive smell of Slade’s classroom: the strong scent of coffee, from the pot he always had brewing.
Cole, who had interviewed Slade a few times for the school’s broadcast journalism program, described Slade as “full of knowledge” about the community of Vancleave. Students said he also served as a mentor for other history teachers at the school.
Matthew Shows, a senior in Slade’s world civilizations class this year, said he had never seen the Vancleave community come together the way it has to honor Slade. He recognized at least 50 of his classmates lining Bulldog Lane.
“He was always himself,” Shows said. “He was a man of God. His students knew that.”
Shows said that he has never before experienced the death of a teacher in the middle of the school year. He was in Slade’s classroom for about two weeks before Slade contracted the coronavirus. Shows said his class had been told that a teacher from another school will be instructing them virtually for the rest of the year.
Slade’s absence will shape the rest of the year, students agreed.
In the face of unprecedented loss, it was some comfort that Slade had so loved his work as a history teacher and his involvement at his church, including as a Sunday school teacher and singer in the choir.
“He was teaching us about the American Dream, and he said he was living his... being a history teacher,” said junior Patricia Slade. “Because that’s what he loved to do and what he wanted to do until he died.”
It was a comfort, too, that he had set such a clear example for others to follow, Cole said: “Be there for people, and listen to what they have to say.”
“He had goals for each person,” said junior Damion Forehand. “You still gotta do what he would want you to do.”
Slade was 53 years old.
A GoFundMe page has been set up to collect donations for his family.
