Duval County

Friends were waiting for Jake Godbold to arrive to lunch when they learned of his passing, friend says

Friends were waiting for Jake Godbold to arrive lunch when they learned of his passing, friend says

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Jacksonville is mourning the loss of former mayor Jake Godbold, who died Thursday at the age of 86.

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The president of the Jacksonville Association of Firefighters, Randy Wyse, told Action News Jax in a phone conversation, that he was waiting to meet Godbold for lunch on Thursday.

“I was kind of curious about why he didn’t show up, and then I got a call from the department, which advised me that they’d found him at his house,” Wyse said.

After getting the news, Wyse says he then had to tell Godbold’s two friends, who sat with him waiting for the former mayor.

Those friends were Mike Tolbert, who authored the book “Jake!: The Last Southern Populist Mayor Who Transformed Jacksonville, Florida from a Sleepy City with an Inferiority Complex Into a Dynamic Metropolis with a Can-Do Attitude,” and Larry Osborne, district vice president of the Jacksonville Association of Firefighters.

They were meeting to talk about the book, and an upcoming event for firefighters.

“To pass that along, that news along, to two close friends, you know, wasn’t good,” said Wyse. “I thought it was appropriate that we had good friends together in the same place.”

Godbold’s legacy has close ties with the fire department. In March 2007, a 1,700 horsepower, jet propelled fire boat was named after Godbold.

Wyse tells us Godbold will be missed by Jacksonville firefighters.

“It never was ‘the fire department,’ or ‘fire and rescue,’ or ‘those guys.’ It was always ‘my firefighters,’ and that’s the way we always felt about him,” Wyse said.

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