John Mason Snuggs was born in 1931 to Southern Baptist missionaries Harold and Grace Snuggs, while they were on their first furlough in Richmond, USA. They returned to China, where John grew up with his older brother, John, and his sister, Margaret Anne.
After the family’s return from furlough, John attended the Shanghai American School.
Like many South China missionary families, the Snuggs family rented a house on Cheung Chau, Hong Kong, for their summer holidays. During the summer of 1936, the island’s Residents' Association organised a concert in the Assembly Hall featuring music, singing, and recitations by missionaries and residents. Many members of the community took part.
Five-year-old John along with older brother Harry (9), joined four other children in costume to perform the song When I Grow Up, which was very well received. Young John also gave a recitation entitled Lollypop and, although his voice did not carry to the back of the hall, his effort was considered praiseworthy. The event raised funds for repairs to the Assembly Hall.
In September 1937, Grace Snuggs and her children were staying at House 3A on Cheung Chau. By this time the summer holiday season had ended, but because Japan was invading South China, missionary families remained on the island while their husbands returned to their mission stations. It was during this period that the severe typhoon of that year struck. During the night, the storm tore the roof from their house, forcing the family to seek refuge with neighbours. Contemporary accounts of the event specifically mention "ten-year-old Harold", but not John or Margaret.
In November 1940, as the Japanese threat increased, Grace returned to the USA with her three children and spent the war in Greenville, South Carolina.
Harold Snuggs Sr. was interned by the Japanese in Pootung, Shanghai. He was repatriated to the United States in 1943.
After his schooling, Snuggs returned to the USA and was inducted in 1954 into the U.S. Army during the Korean War, where he served 18 months as a drafter at the Beale Air Force Base near Marysville, CA.
He then attended Tulane University in New Orleans, LA (BA Physics) graduating in 1959. He also attended Georgia Institute of Technology, and Furman University in Greenville, South Carolina.
Also in 1959, he married Louise Wallen in Arlington, VA. They had 4 children and moved to the Atlanta area in 1968.
Snuggs enjoyed a distinguished 40-year career in the Data Communications industry, serving as a Regional Sales Manager and maintaining membership of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) for more than half a century.
In retirement, he remained active, working as a tutor with Academic Solutions from 1999 to 2010. The role brought him great satisfaction, fulfilling a long-held ambition to teach, a passion that had first found expression years earlier through his work as a Sunday School teacher.
From 1968 to 2016, Snuggs and his family were actively involved in different Baptist churches in Georgia.
Snuggs was also deeply engaged in public life. An active member of the DeKalb County Republican Party, he rose to the position of Precinct Captain in 1988.
He died in 2016.
Sources:
The Evangelical Beacon, 19th October 1937.