- Date Of Birth: November 11, 1923
- Date Of Death: December 8, 2012
- State: Georgia
James Howard Sasse passed away Saturday, December 8, 2012. A native of Henderson, Kentucky, he was the son of John Gottlieb Sasse and Ollie Mae Loney Sasse. Jim was a high school football and track star and played in his senior year as an end in the Shiners’ All Star Game in Lexington Kentucky in 1941. He attended the University of Chattanooga on a football scholarship and also appeared in the first production of the newly formed Chattanooga Opera Company before enlisting in the Navy where he served during World War II in the Navy Air Corps as a radio man on missions in the North Atlantic and Mediterranean. After the war Jim returned to Chattanooga and graduated from UC with a degree in music. For many years he was a featured tenor with opera companies across the country. He won a national singing competition in 1955 and appeared that year with the New Orleans Opera Company singing the role of Pinkerton in “Madame Butterfly.” He continued to perform lead opera roles into the 1980s. In 1951 he married the former Carolyn Louise Murphy and they had four children, Stephen Anthony Sasse (Sonia), James Everett Sasse (Susan), Carl David Sasse (Chris), and Sharon Louise Sasse.
