William Cobb

COBB, WILLIAM A.
SEPTEMBER 15, 1932 - JANUARY 3, 2019
On January 3, 2019, William (Bill) A. Cobb joined his Lord and Savior after a battle with Alzheimer's disease.
He is survived by his wife, Marlene, of Ocala; daughter, Cheryl Watson of Fort Mill, SC; son, William (Bill) Cobb of Scottsdale, AZ; and six grandchildren.

Bill and Marlene lived in Anthony for 26 years before moving to Ocala memory care facilities in late 2017. Bill was born in Elberton, Georgia, graduated from Valdosta High School, and then University of Georgia's Landscape Architecture program. He joined the US Navy and was stationed in Hawaii from 1955 until 1957, where he met Marlene on Waikiki Beach and they were married in Vancouver, British Columbia (where Marlene was raised) in August 1957. They moved to Gainesville where he attended the University of Florida for two years before starting his landscape architecture career in Vancouver, British Columbia. Bill's career included: having multiple positions with the State of California, Division of Beaches and Parks; working for a consulting firm in Southern California that did the landscape planning for Walt Disney World; being a partner in a consulting firm in Denver, CO for several years; moving to Dallas for several years to work on a major development project and then moving to Stone Mountain, Georgia to work for a landscape contracting firm before relocating to Anthony in 1991.

He worked for Marion County in its land-use planning group from 1991 until his retirement, although he remained active in real estate and land use consulting for several more years. Bill and Marlene celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 2007 by visiting Hawaii again with their son's family.

In his post-retirement years, Bill loved taking care of the plants and cows around their 9-acre farm in Anthony, which was his pride and joy until advancing dementia forced both Bill and Marlene to leave their beloved farm. They are members of First Baptist Church of Sparr where Bill loved teaching The Navigators Bible memory program and had a heart for mission work.

Memorial service will be at 4:00 p.m., Saturday, April 6, 2019, at Countryside Funeral Home, Anthony, FL. The family requests that donations be made to L3 Ministries, 705 Lakeview Dr., Pineville, NC 28134 in lieu of flowers to honor his passion to see God's Word taught worldwide.