Hobert Combs lived his life to help others.

“He’d do anything for anybody,” said granddaughter Crystal Scott of Hamilton. “He’d take his shirt off his back for you. He was a very caring person.”

Combs, a longtime Hamilton resident, died Monday at 88 years old.

He was born in Buckhorn, Ky., on Feb. 16, 1924, and served as a mechanic in the U.S. Army Air Corps in Alaska during World War II.

“He said it was so cold it wasn’t a problem keeping their food cold, it was keeping it from freezing,” said his son, Terry Combs.

Hobert Combs married Genevieve Saylor on Nov. 23, 1946 in Hamilton. The couple had three sons, Gary, David and Terry.

“He instilled a work ethic in you from the time you could work,” Terry Combs said. “He could do just about anything so we all know how to do just about anything.”

“Everything” included, but was not limited to, building and remodeling houses, hunting game and raising livestock.

“We didn’t eat fast food,” Terry Combs said. “It was hamburgers and French fries, home made. He was self-sufficient.”

Combs worked from 1950 to 1989 as carpenter at Brock & Sons Construction, which started out on Pershing Avenue before moving to its current location on South Gilmore Road.

“He just constantly worked,” Terry Combs said. “He wasn’t fast but he was steady and he never stopped. If he cut his finger, he’d reach down and get dirt to pack around it. There wasn’t a Band-Aid. He’d just keep right on going. That’s just the kind of person he was.”

Above all, Hobert Combs was a generous man.

“Everybody would come to him for whatever problem they had,” Terry Combs said. “He’d help anybody. If somebody in the family needed a roof put on them, he was there to help.”

Combs is survived by his wife Genevieve, three sons, two brothers, five grandchildren, nine great-grandchildren, one great-great-grandchild and many other family and friends.

Visitation will be held from 11 a.m. to noon today at the Brown-Dawson-Flick Funeral Home, 1350 Millville Avenue. Funeral service are scheduled for noon with burial following in Millville Cemetery.