At 80 years old, James Stroud Sr. was known as “Old Man Jimmy.”
The son who shares his name admired and emulated his father at every turn — from taking over his towing business to picking up funny phrases his dad liked to use — and even smoking cigarettes.
“My dad was just a good guy, people from all over the city knew him” James Stroud Jr. said. “He enjoyed his life.”
Now the family is grappling with the agony of how James Stroud Sr. could have been taken from them so violently, shot to death Wednesday as he sat in his parked burgundy SUV in the Washington Heights neighborhood.
James Stroud Jr. shared his memories with the Sun-Times Thursday at his father’s Auburn Gresham home.
Tough when he needed to be, James Stroud Sr. was the kind of person who called everyone “sweetheart,” said his son. Best friends, they spoke every day.
“I just wanted to be like him, and that’s probably why I’m Junior,” Stroud Jr. said. “He treated me very well.”
The elder Stroud was killed about 10 a.m. Wednesday in the 1400 block of West 90th Street.
Police say another SUV approached, possibly a black GMC, and an assailant inside opened fire, shooting James Stroud Sr. in his head and back before speeding away south on Bishop Street.
The elder Stroud was a tow truck driver for his company, “Night and Day,” and previously owned car lots throughout the city. When he retired a couple of months ago, his son took over the company and renamed it “Jimmi’s Night and Day.”
James Stroud Jr. was at work at the city’s Water Department when he took a phone call from his mother, Fannie Mae Fields, who was checking to make sure he was OK after police showed up at their home.
“I was sick,” James Stroud Jr. said. “I had seen my dad’s [license] plates, and I was hurt. … My legs started hurting, I was walking, and they’d start locking up on me.”
Fields, James Stroud Sr.’s partner of nearly six decades, condemns gun violence. She last saw James Stroud Sr. 40 minutes before the shooting, when he told her he was going out, shortly after taking a phone call, she said.
The family is hoping police can go through his call logs to see if the shooting was connected to that call.
“It never stops,” Fields said of shootings that seem to plague the city. “Why would somebody walk up and shoot at [her partner] for no reason?”
Fields and James Stroud Sr. married in April 1966 and divorced in the 1990s, but they never truly stayed apart and lived in the same house in Auburn Gresham.
“I never wanted to be exactly separated from James because he always [played] a big part in my life,” Fields said.
When asked how they navigated through trials and tribulations, Fields responded, “being understanding.”
“He always helped me,” Fields added.
James Stroud Sr. also had a deep understanding of what it means to play fair in life.
“If you talk nice [to him] nice will come back to you, but he didn’t play no games,” his son said. “If you rub him the wrong way, he will rub you the wrong way.”
James Stroud Sr. was born in Durham, North Carolina, and raised in Newburgh, New York. He moved to the West Side of Chicago in 1964, about a year before he met Fields, and the two moved to Auburn Gresham in 1972 and lived in the same home for more than 50 years.
In his later years, he’d spend hours at a McDonald’s on 127th Street playing chess or conversing with friends. He also enjoyed Western shows and movies, including “Walker, Texas Ranger. “
“Got to be more careful!” he would say as he laughed at a character finding themselves in a predicament.
“It was just little phrases that he would say that you’ll never forget,” James Stroud Jr. said.
James Stroud Sr. had four children with Fields, about 12 grandchildren and about 10 great-grandchildren who live in Chicago.
One of the many friends and loved ones who streamed in and out of their home Thursday to check on the family was James Stroud Sr.’s 33-year-old granddaughter, Justina Smith, who brought Fields chocolates in a heart-shaped box, candles and a photo album.
“My daddy was a pillar in the neighborhood,” James Stroud Jr. said. “An 80-year-old man getting killed while sitting in a car, that just doesn’t sound right.”