To my sweet friend Chad and his Family...
May God take your father in his arms...
Stop his pain and hold him tight until you and your family are
 with him again 💖💕💖

We are so sorry for your loss.  May the Lord bring you all peace & comfort as you mourn.  Our prayers are with all you.

Tommy would doodle a lot and I loved to see what he would draw.  He soon channeled those artistic talents into a profession.  He became an architect and began doing watercolors like our father did.  He built houses and traveled to foreign places working on projects, and he worked for NASA on projects in Florida, wrote a very organized book, and taught at Georgia Tech for a while.

His knowledge and abilities were amazing, and when we had problems with a plumber cutting a supporting beam in our house under the first floor, Tommy called me every day walking me through how to get them to do what they should and how to protect ourselves legally.  He taught me about change orders and what types of things to include in a letter and how to deal with the planning department at City Hall.  The company eventually repaired it correctly.  The owner wanted to know who wrote the letter.  When we said that we had written it, the owner said, “I need to get you to write my letters.”  When the builder in the subdivision undercut our wall in back of our 3-car garage it had the potential of destabilizing our garage.  Tommy again called me every day and taught me about landscape architects and what needed to be done to stabilize that area and how it needed to be handled as the planning department was very unsympathetic. He even told me legal steps to take if it weren’t resolved.   Tommy was amazing and didn’t stop calling until all problems were resolved.

This surely doesn’t cover everything, but I can only say that he has been a lifelong, devoted friend, mentor, father figure, and an incredible human being.  The sun always rose and set on my brother.  He could do no wrong in my eyes.  I will always be indebted to him for his kindness, his unfailing love, and his protection and support.  He is an extraordinary brother and it is such a privilege to have had him in my life.

Our parents loved to play cards with friends.  One night Tommy and I went over to the Arthur’s house with our parents as they had 4 children.  As the parents began to play, the kids all retreated into the kid’s bedroom and someone had a bright idea!  We turned over the bunk beds on their sides and moved one of the beds to the other side of the room to use as a bulwark.  Then everyone took off their shoes and started heaving them at the other “side” like a snowball fight and the war began.  I stood for a brief moment and got the wind knocked out of me.  They all kept telling me not to cry and were giving me water all the while telling me that the parents would make us stop playing and nobody wanted the game to stop, even me!

We would go to the mountains to Vogel State Park with my mother’s youngest brother and his family. There we could swim, ride horses, and have a wonderful picnic.  We would put a large watermelon in the stream to cool it.  One year our sister, Evangeline brought a date, and he went to the stream to fetch the watermelon and dropped It in the stream and it cracked in two.  But it didn’t daunt anything.  Tommy, Doyle, Katie, and I would go to the concession stand and buy Sugar Daddies.  It was always a delightful time together.

One summer, Tommy and some neighborhood boys told us that they were going on an elephant hunt.  My friend, David and I wanted to be part of the adventure.  We all descended the steep road passing the stands of bamboo that we would make whistles from, past the old log cabin, and on down by the cliff dwellers on the high banks toward the bottom of the hill.  Then we all climbed the bank on the left and entered someone’s backyard.  The man came out with a gun and the big boys were gone in seconds--vanished in thin air.  David and I follow down the bank and ascended the hill back to our homes.  When we got to the top of the street we started popping tar bubbles on the hot road with our bare toes.  We were young enough that the police never suspected us and passed us by and went on down the hill.

Another time, Tommy decided to go ice skating in his socks on the pond at Lake Moore.  The ice is never thick on the lakes in winter in Atlanta, and he fell in.  He had to walk a mile home soaking wet in the cold!

Water seemed to be a fascination for Tommy.  He and Richard made a makeshift raft and decided to float it down Peachtree Creek, unaware that at one point there was a weir.  When the raft came to the weir, and was about to go over it, Tommy grabbed a tree branch with one hand and Richard with the other.  They were truly watched over that day!

Tommy was my personal playmate and friend.  We would sit up and talk well into the night.  By day he taught me to ride my bike and dive in a swimming pool.  He rode me on the handle bars of his bike and carry me on his shoulders.  We would wrestle and he would say, “You’re wirey.”  Or, he would chase me about the house and I would be screaming.  Being 5 years older than me he had an edge on me and when I thought he would overtake me I would drop to my knees suddenly and curl up in a ball thinking that he would trip over me then I could run the other way, although it caught him by surprise, he did everything to avoid running into me.  Then I would jump up and run the other way and the chase would be on again.

He would tease me.  Tommy would draw an imaginary line on the floor and tell me not to cross it knowing full well what I would do.  Immediately I stuck my foot over the line.  He told me to open my mouth and he started pouring different things on my tongue to force me to “give up.”  But I was a stubborn little thing. He would pour Worcestershire Sauce on my tongue, then vinegar, and a variety of things, but when he put a piece of bread in water and wanted me to eat it, I just couldn’t.  When he saw that I was distressed about it, he had compassion and stopped, saying, “I just can’t do that to you.”

Once someone told me that my brother was really handsome.  I was shocked, all this time I just thought he was my brother.  It never occurred to me that I had a handsome brother!

When my mother was pregnant with me, she asked Tommy if he wanted a boy or a girl.  “A boy,” was his reply.  When he discovered that I was a girl he was most unhappy.  My Father being a very wise man, purchased a water pistol which satisfied Tommy.

Aunt Nettie and Uncle Nick had no children for 13 years of their marriage.  They longed for children so Mother would send Tommy and me over there to spend time with them.  
Uncle Nick took us to a nearby airfield within walking distance of their house.  The Blue Angels were putting on air show that was quite thrilling.

Our backyard was a wonderful gathering place for family, friends and neighborhood children.  There was plenty of space for adventure.

The Sutter family of 6 kids would emerge and there would be an instant game of Kick-the-Can in the dark with the spotlight on the porch shining into the night’s darkness.  When the can was kicked, everyone would scatter into the neighborhood and hide.  Then the person who was “IT” would have to count then go and find everyone.  It was a glorified came of Hide and Seek, but the can made it so much more exciting.   Tommy hid in the rafters of the Daughtry’s garage and he was so well hidden that we never found him, even to tell him that the game was over.

Or we would play Cops and Robbers.  The Robbers would take off and write clues with chalk on the black pavement of the street for the cops to follow.

Memorial Service

Reception

Mr. Papageorge is survived by his wife of 22 years, Andrea L. Papageorge; sons, David Papageorge (Debbie), Steven Papageorge (Kristen), Chad Papageorge; grandchildren, Morgan Papageorge (Wes), Thomas Papageorge, Mary Papageorge, Alex Papageorge, David Papageorge, Peter Papageorge; sisters, Evangeline Wilbanks, Connie Wheeler (Ned); and many nieces, nephews, and cousins.

OBITUARY

Thomas E. Papageorge

February 24, 1942 – October 24, 2025

H.M. Patterson & Son-Arlington Chapel

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