ALICEVILLE | Rev. Ellis Earl Tate, age 77, of Aliceville, died September 29, 2014, at Aliceville Manor Nursing Home. Graveside services will be 11 a.m. Thursday, October 2, 2014, at Franconia-Oak Grove Cemetery with Rev. Charles Wilson and Rev. Larry Potts officiating and Skelton Funeral Home of Reform directing.
He was preceded in death by his parents; sister, Annie Grace Blakney Estes and niece, Donna Blakney.
Survivors include a very special cousin, Peggy Tate Strawn of Carrollton, Ala.; niece, Linda Ferguson of Millport, Ala.; nephew, Ken Blakney of Hokes Bluff, Ala.; his special church families of Murrah's Chapel Baptist Church of Columbus, Miss. and Sumterville Baptist Church in Sumter County, Ala.; and special friends, Suzanne Forbey-Bolton and Bobby Bolton.
Rev. Tate was born May 15, 1937 in Pickens County, Alabama to the late Garvin Tate and Lenora Heritage Tate. He served in the ministry for over 57 years having ministered in churches in Pickens, Greene and Sumter counties in Alabama and also in Lowndes County in Mississippi, where he retired from Murrah's Chapel Baptist Church. He was a veteran of the U.S. Air Force and a retired employee of Huyck Felt Company with 20 years of service.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorials be made to Murrah's Chapel Baptist Church Children's Fund, P.O. Box 2204, Columbus, MS 39704.