Tamarind Santa's gift 4,000 toys (PBP) 12-25-87MBER 25, 1987 FINAL EDITION
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Santa's gift:
4, 000 toys
By LYNDA R. PAGE
Palm Beach Post staff Writer
WEST PALM BEACH — The
spirits of Christmas and T.J. Tuck-
er filled a 28 -foot truck Thursday
with dolls, balls and games and
spilled over to excite hundreds of
youngsters in a line stretching
down Tamarind Avenue.
"It's wonderful," said Tucker's
daughteir, Faith Tucker. "I think he
would be absolutely ecstatic. He's
watching us. I know he's here with
us."
People responded to news of T.J.
Tucker's death Dec. 7 by contribut-
ing more toys than ever to make
successful what would have been
the shopkeeper's 11th annual
Christmas Eve giveaway at
Tammi Tuck Convenience Store.
Tucker was active in improving
West Palm Beach's rundown inner
city since he opened Tammi Tuck's
Market at Tamarind Avenue and
10th Street.
Tucker began No Dope Sold To-
day in 1986, a street party to bring
the anti-drug message to the com-
munity. He asked the Guardian An-
gels to come to West Palm Beach
from New York in early 1987 to
fight area crime. In 1986, Tucker
won WPEC-TV's (Channel 12) Jef-
ferson Award for community ser-
vice.
Af ter his death, Tucker's daugh•
ters vowed to keep alive the legac3
of the "Santa of Tamarind Ave,
nue."First they had to make surf
they had enough toys. That turnec
out to be easy.
"We stopped counting at 3,868'
toys, Faith Tucker said.
That's almost 1,000 more toys
contributed than last year.
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Please see TUCKER/8A
's la at .the Tammi
RayShawn King, delighted to be on Santa p Tuck toy giveaway Thursday,
receives a teddy bear. Volunteers `stopped counting when 3,868 toys had been donated.
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11DAYJ Tucker, crimefig'hter, dies
T. J. TUCKER/from 1 B
Sold Today" block party, where businesses contributed
food, T-shirts and money for the rally. Kids willing to
give up drugs for a day got T-shirts and hot dogs.
` "He saw the good in everyone. He would say they
are all God's children. These are the prodigal sons
coming home, he would say," said attorney Patti
Velasquez, who helped work on the drug-free day.
Mr. Tucker aimed to reclaim the street from drug
dealers. When a 7 -year-old girl was killed in the cross-
fire between drug dealers in 1986, Mr. Tucker invited
the Guardian Angels here.
"Mr. Tucker was in the middle of the war zone. He
knew there could be a backlash: his store blown up, his
family hassled. It showed courage on his part," Mar-
tinelli said.
To serve as an example, Mr. Tucker completed
training with the group to earn an Angels' T-shirt and
red beret. "I figured if I passed the test, black kids
would say, `If Grampa made it, so can I,' " Mr. Tucker
said at the time.
His methods worked in his block of Tamarind.
"Dealers had a grudging respect for Mr. Tucker.
They wouldn't sell in front of his store," Martinelli
said. "People were really intimidated by the drug
trafficking in the area. But Tammi had the rapport to.
talk with the fellows (drug dealers)," said City Com-
missioner James Poole.
,!",4 ' Mr. Tucker, born Trillier Johnell, was one of 23
children of a Decatur, Ala., family. After a stint in
India during World War II, he and his wife, Veloria
(Flo), bought an eatery in a Cleveland suburb. They
ii"Amed it after their firstborn daughter — Tammi
Tuck's Restaurant.
- Ever since then, people have assumed that Mr.
T.J. Tucker was Tammi Tuck. Tammi became his
nickname. He let it stick.
. Eventually, his brother convinced him that Flori-
n had better weather than Ohio. He moved his wife
and four daughters south in 1972.
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When he bought a restaurant in Loxahatchee that
year, it caused a stir — he was the first black man to
own a business in the area. After he and his wif e
divorced, he closed the restaurant and moved to West
Palm Beach with plans to open another. Instead, he
started the Tammi Tuck Convenience Store.
"There's no other Dad like him in the world," said
his daughter, Lauren, 24, who helps run the store."I
feel an emptiness inside of me without my father
around."
In 1976, Mr. Tucker gave 70 toys to neighborhood
children to attract business.
"Then I felt that some of these kids wouldn't get
anything else if I didn't continue," he said several
years ago.
Each year he stretched streamers and tinsel along
the barbed-wire above the chainlink fence leading to
the store's service entrance. He handed out more than
2,000 presents last year with the help of neighbors and
the Guardian Angels.
The Junior League of the Palm Beaches has
pledged to help Faith and Lauren assure that Mr.
Tucker's Christmas Eve tradition continues without
him. The Guardian Angels will help distribute gif ts.
West Palm Beach city commissioners Monday
offered the Gaines Park Recreation Center to continue
the drive. About half of the 2,000 toys have been
promised but none delivered yet. Toys can be dropped
off at the store, 1026 Tamarind Ave., or at the Santa
booth at the Cross County Mall.
"That was his worry all last week," Faith said,
"that the children wouldn't have Christmas."
Mr. Tucker is survived by his former wife, Veloria
of Delray Beach; his daughters, Tamara, 28, of Atlan-
ta; Lauren, 24, of West Palm Beach; Faith, 25, and
Trella, 18, of Delray Beach. A memorial service is
scheduled for 1 p.m. Saturday at Tabernacle Mission-
ary Baptist Church, 801 Eighth St., West Palm Beach.
Coleman Funeral Home is handling the arrangements.
Staff writer Lynda R. Page contributed to this
story.
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Pallbearers carry the casket of T.J. Tucker at the Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church in West Palm Beach after the memorial service'' Saturday.
enue s of hope is buried
Tamarind Av,,.,, beacon
By LISA OCKER Missionary Baptist Church. "I for one Faith, put their arms around each other, killed by drug dealers, organized a toy
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer would be very, very sad that, with his leaned forward and wept. giveaway for needy chilren and led an
WEST PALM BEACH — About 150 passing, we ' f orgot what he showed us Others in the church included the red- effort to fight drug abuse by sponsoring
people said goodbye Saturday to T.J.
• • • We can't forget that it's unaccept- bereted men of the Guardian An- No Dope Sold Today.
ucker a man the remembered as d t young
having done more than just "mind his
own store."
They mourned his passing and chal-
lenged each other to keep alive the spir-
it of the 68 -year-old storekeeper by per-
petuating his good deeds — fighting
drug abuse and crime, giving toys to
children on Christmas Eve — and pur-
suing his goal to establish a Community
Crisis Center.
"He showed us that we can make a
!if f erence," Mayor Rick Reikenis eulo-
!zed during the funeral at Tabernacle
able dust to min our own sores.
Mr. Tucker died Dec. 7 of prostate
cancer.
As his relatives filed past the open
casket draped with an American flag
and surrounded by 18 floral arrange-
ments, his daughters broke down in
sobs.
"Oh, daddy. Oh, daddy," 24 -year-old
Lauren Tucker wailed as she was
helped to her seat in the first pew.
When a woman with contra alto voice
sang, May the Work I've bone Speak for
Me, Lauren and her sister, 25 -year-old
gels, city commissioners, middle-aged
couples, old women hunched over walk-
ing canes and younger ones with babies
asleep on their laps. The movement of
handkerchiefs to teary eyes and their
programs used as fans stirred the gold-
en -pink light streaming through
stained-glass windows.
They wept, and smiled sometimes
too, when ministers talked about the
good things Mr. Tucker did, how he
brought the Guardian Angels to town
_after a 7 -year-old child was shot and
"He's a worker who'll be sorely
missed," said West Palm Beach Com-
missioner Samuel Thomas, who had
known Mr. Tucker about a decade. "T.J.
was — the word is overused — but he
certainly was an innovator, as is obvi-
ous by his work.
"You don't replace the T.J.s," Thom -.,,
as said. "With God's help, you find an'.
other one, but you can't replace th
T.J.s."
Please see FUNERAL/ 19B ` �a
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C.J. WALKER/Staff Photographer
I(T. J. pucker's daughters, Faith, Lauren and Tammi, comfort each other at their father's fune, al.
1 „
Funeralmourns sal Irl of T.J. Tucker
"On Tamarind Avenue, he's al-
transition was imminent."
:FUNERAL/from 1 B
most like a beacon of hope," said
"And, guess what?" King asked
,-,Because of Mr. Tucker, prayed
Paul Martinelli, East Coast direc-
the congregation. "He ain't gone."
the' Rev. Thomas Masters of the
Greater Macedonia Baptist Church
for of the Guardian Angels, a New
York -based citizens patrol group.
suggested minister
The malleori-
g
in Riviera Beach "someone has a
"Now we all have that moral obli-
cally that a sign might be placed in
the window of Tammi Tuck's Con
toy who didn't have a toy, someone
gation to carry the torch."
-
venience ;tore at 10th and Tama
,bias turned away from the rocks
�
nd gotten on the rock."
The
The Rev. Derek King said Mr.
rind Avenue, stating: "Still in busi-
Tucker, born Trillier Johnell
suffered stoicly through his
illness. He said he visited the dying
ness, just moved upstairs."
Ilcker in Decatur, Ala., moved his
f e ;and four daughters from Ohio
man eight days ago in the hospital.
Loxahatchee in 1972. They
"He was so persuasive that he'd
ted a restaurant. After the
almost make you believe that he
-ers were divorced 41/2 years
was ready to leave the hospital. He
Tucker moved to West Palm
was that ready to get back to
and opened his store.
work," King said. "But I knew his