In tribute: Muffley spent a lifetime serving others

CLOVIS — Russell Muffley was serving people all his life — as a funeral director, a judge, a cook, a sports announcer, a family man — and last month turned over that legacy of service to his surviving family and friends.

"On Tuesday, April 2, 2019, Russell Muffley was shaking hands with friends and family who greeted him as he arrived in Heaven," said his obituary. "Through the 40 plus years of greeting people with a firm and sincere handshake, people came to know and trust Russell Muffley."

Those four decades followed the purchase in 1978 of what is now Muffley Funeral Home, three years after moving to Clovis and eight years after completing his apprenticeship to become a licensed embalmer-funeral director at New Mexico State University. Before that he worked at his father's restaurant in Las Cruces, where he learned some of the dishes that he would replicate through his life and pass on to his descendant — "Christmas tacos,” red fish slathered in sauce, wings of all variety.

Born Sept. 25, 1947 in Galion, Ohio, Muffley remained a Buckeyes fan through his life, proudly sporting the knit caps with the team logo gifted him by friends in recent years during his chemotherapy treatments. Some in Clovis may also remember him for his 13 years announcing Wildcat football, basketball and occasionally baseball games on the radio.

Muffley merged many of his pastimes — for people and conversation, sports and food — at Monday night football gatherings at his residence or daily coffee klatches at the funeral home.

"Muffley was very much interested in the political situation, stayed current with a lot of things. He could discuss politics intelligently, rather than just screaming out the current line, which I appreciated," recalled Clovis City Commissioner Rube Render, a longtime member of the morning coffee group. "And I thought he had a great sense of humor. I do know that he helped an awful lot of people in moments of great stress and emotional situations. ... In that line of work, if you don’t have a sense of humor, you can become a pretty dour person, I think."

Known to many as "Judge," Muffley was also Clovis' municipal judge from 1984 until his retirement in 2002. He wore many other hats in his time, too — among them as a trustee for Clovis Community College, co-chair for Relay For Life and Chairman of the city's Senior Citizen Resident Center.

It was in the latter position that he first came to work with Bobby Jack Stewart, who had retired from 33 years selling automobiles and went on to join Muffley at the funeral home, running the crematory.

"Not everybody can do what we are sometimes called upon to do," Stewart told The News. "It takes a special kind of individual to be able to do that and continue doing it and not go completely crazy."

For Stewart, a "very deep faith" went a long way, and he believed the same was true for Muffley. Taking on the delicate task of funereal arrangements, often executed on short notice, took a level of organization and compassion that Muffley had in abundance.

"I’ve seen him deal with hundreds of people. Not only was he always very professional, but he allowed those folks to express their feelings and desires for their loved ones," Stewart said. "He had a very strong work ethic and he took care of people. He would have been a very wealthy man had he been able to collect everything he was doing for the funeral services."

Stewart estimated it was close to a million dollars worth of funeral services and arrangements that Muffley never collected on, either because someone's insurance didn't come through or they were simply unable to pay.

"You would be absolutely amazed," Stewart said. "If you talk about a man’s heart, he probably had as big of one as maybe two or three other people I’ve known. I’ll miss that man dearly."

Muffley sometimes went well above the expectations of his position. Stewart recalled an incident when Muffley received a call from the Dade County Medical Examiner in Miami, reporting that a sealed box containing human ashes and his funeral home's number had washed up in one of their harbors.

Muffley tracked those cremains to the decedent's widow, who had moved to Florida and left the remains with her brother-in-law to deposit in the ocean during their deep sea fishing off the peninsular coast. That in-law fulfilled the task in part, but failed to remove the ashes from the funeral-home issued plastic container before doing so.

"Anybody he dealt with, he always gave of himself," Stewart recalled. "He was a very giving, loving man. He loved his family dearly and he loved his employees and he took care of them. I think that legacy will live on for a long, long time. I know it will in my life."