James Joe Diffley

James Joe Diffley, 90, of Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, husband of Leah Kathryn Forester Diffley entered into eternal rest Sunday, September 22, 2024. His Funeral Service will be held Saturday, September 28, 2024 in the Wages Funeral Home, 3705 US Highway 78, Snellville GA at 2:00 pm. Interment will follow at Eternal Hills Memory Gardens 3700 Stone Mountain Hwy., Snellville, GA 30039. The family will receive friends one hour prior to the service. Arrangements by J. Henry Stuhr, Inc. Mount Pleasant Chapel.

 Jim was born June 18, 1934 in Atlanta, Georgia, son of the late Joseph Patrick Diffley and the late Lola Vivienne Foster Diffley. He graduated from Brown High School in Atlanta in 1952 where he was President of the Student Body, the Georgia Institute of Technology in 1956 with a B.S. in Industrial Management and a member of Kappa Sigma Fraternity and subsequently earned an M.B.A. from Georgia State University. He served in the U.S. Air Force between 1956 and 1959 and attained the rank of captain. Jim worked 40 years in management at the Technical Operations Center at Delta Air Lines where he was responsible for Tech Ops worldwide. While raising his family and contributing to the growth of Delta Air Lines, he served on the Governor’s High Technology Council for the State of Georgia, Board of Trustees for the Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics, Management Consultant to World Airways, the Advisory Board of the Aircraft Maintenance School Advisory Board, the General Advisory Board of Clayton State University and the Advisory Board of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. He was an adjunct professor at Georgia State University and served as an Elder, Deacon and head of the Diaconate for Eastminster Presbyterian Church in Smoke Rise, Georgia.

 Perhaps his proudest professional accomplishment is his involvement with the Delta Community Credit Union. His service spanned 62 continuous years where he was chosen chairman by his fellow directors in 1986 and remained so until his death. He was an early supporter of a 20-year cultural exchange program between credit unions in the U.S. and Poland that launched in the 1990s and later received the Moses C. Davis Lifetime Achievement Award from GCUA in 2017. He and his wife attended countless credit union conventions and events where they made many lifelong friends and memories.

 Jim was a voracious reader and an avid traveler. His travels include a ground breaking trip to the Soviet Union in 1972 where he would return three more times, polar bear dips in Finland, snowmobiling in Yellowstone Park with his wife Leah and friends, and the witnessing of the fall of the Berlin Wall, countless places in Europe and the United States, Japan and Hong Kong. It was important to him to take his family on many his adventures and always integrated it with his love of history and an appreciation of the local people.

 In addition to his wife of 68 years. he is survived by son Gary Diffley (Terry), grandson Win Diffley, granddaughters Sloan Diffley and Mary Grace Diffley; son Greg Diffley (Janet) and grandsons Sean Diffley (Miranda), Ryan Diffley (Hadley) and Ian Diffley; daughter Suzanne Vesper (Glenn), granddaughters Evie Vesper and Bennett Vesper and grandson Duncan Vesper; two great grandchildren and brother Steve Diffley (Kitty). In addition to his parents, he was preceded in death by a son Andrew Forester Diffley.

 Memorials may be made to the Wounded Warrior Project or St. Jude Children’s Hospital.