15 Facts About Sam Massell

Sam Massell was known as "Buddy" during his childhood and high school years.

Sam Massell graduated from Druid Hills High School at age 16 and enrolled at the University of Georgia in Athens, where he was a member of the Phi Kappa Literary Society.

Sam Massell was president of Phi Epsilon Pi fraternity.

For twenty years, Sam Massell was a realtor, having become vice president of the Allan-Grayson Realty Company, then one of the largest commercial brokerage firms in Atlanta.

Sam Massell was further honored on three occasions by the Georgia Association of Real Estate Boards for the "Outstanding Transaction of the Year".

Sam Massell served twenty-two years in elected office, first as a city councilman in the town of Mountain Park, where he owned a lakehouse.

Sam Massell then went on to serve on the Atlanta City Executive Committee and then ran to serve eight years as President of Atlanta's Board of Aldermen.

Sam Massell ran for Mayor of Atlanta in 1969 and won the race in a runoff.

Sam Massell was a board member of the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games.

Sam Massell pioneered minority opportunities in city government, appointing Panke Bradley as the first woman to the Atlanta City Council and the first African Americans as municipal department heads.

Sam Massell was a Certified Travel Counselor and a former president of the Travel Industry Association of Georgia.

Sam Massell later managed a nonprofit civic organization as the founding president of the Buckhead Coalition, an association of business executives on the north side of Atlanta.

Sam Massell was married to the former Doris Middlebrooks from 1952 until she died in 2015.

In 2016, the 89-year-old Sam Massell wed his long-time friend Sandra Gordy in a private ceremony at their home in Buckhead.

Sam Massell died on March 13,2022, at the age of 94.