Robert Bumpus Jr.
Robert Bumpus Jr., who served as superintendent for Hoover City Schools from 1991 to 1996 and later 1½ years on the Hoover Board of Education in 2003 and 2004, died Wednesday at the age of 90.
Bumpus died in Oklahoma City, where he had moved to be closer to his daughter and her family.
Bumpus, who was Hoover’s second superintendent, also served as superintendent for Midfield City Schools from about 1975 to 1985 and then Homewood City Schools from 1985 to 1991.
In Hoover, he was known as a kindhearted leader and considered a peacemaker between what had been a divided school board and City Council and helped guide the new school system through a period of rapid growth. He brought Jack Farr from Homewood City Schools to serve as his assistant superintendent and groomed Farr to become his successor in Hoover.
Bumpus was instrumental in planning for the opening of a third middle school in Hoover, and soon after he retired in 1996, the Hoover school board named that middle school after him.
While Farr battled brain cancer, Bumpus was appointed to the Hoover Board of Education and was considered a guiding hand and trusted advisor.
Bumpus' career in education started in 1959 in the Jefferson County school system. He served as a teacher, principal, director of middle and elementary schools, and director of instruction for Decatur City Schools and Jefferson County schools before becoming superintendent in Midfield.
Bumpus married his wife, Norma, in 1955, and the couple were married for 61 years until her death in 2016. They had a son, Robert Bumpus III, who died in 2014, and a daughter, Laronda DeLong.
Both Bumpus and his wife were very active in the Nazarene church, while in college in Bethany, Oklahoma and later at Birmingham First Church of the Nazarene and Decatur First Church of the Nazarene.
They worked with children and youth, leading Bible quiz groups and youth choirs, and he ran a bus ministry to bring children to church. Both of them helped plant Forestdale Nazarene Church, served on the Alabama Nazarene District Council and hosted missionaries, pastors and other people in need in their home. Bumpus also was involved with Trevecca Nazarene University in Tennessee.
Funeral arrangements had not been announced as of Wednesday night.
Editor's note: This story was updated at 12:31 p.m. on July 27 to correct the date of marriage for Robert and Norma Bumpus to be 1955.
