Florence, SC- Dr. Dewitt Talmadge Gooden, III, 73, died in the McLeod Hospice House on April 16, 2015, after an illness.

Funeral services will be Sunday, April 19, 2015 at 2:30 p.m. at John Calvin Presbyterian Church, Florence. Interment will follow at Mt. Hope Cemetery. The family will receive family and friends on Saturday evening at Layton-Anderson Funeral Home from 5 to 7 p.m.

Mr. Gooden was born in Elizabethtown, NC, the son of the late DeWitt T. Jr, and Naomi Johnson Gooden. DeWitt was a member of John Calvin Presbyterian Church, having served as an Elder.

He was first a county agent in the tobacco program at NC State University. He managed the variety testing program that was to become the industry standard for cultivar evaluation, disease management and chemical constituents. In 1976, he worked for Phillip Morris, USA. DeWitt became Extension Agronomist for Clemson University in 1979 and Clemson Tobacco Specialist and Coordinator of Tobacco Programs in 1988. He was appointed as an Emeritus faculty at Clemson University. In September of 2013, he received the Phillip Morris Life Time Achievement Award for Tobacco.

Surviving are his wife of 50 years, Mary Thames Gooden; a daughter, Elizabeth Gooden, Florence; a brother, David (Pat) Gooden, Elizabethtown, NC; grandchildren, Canyon and Dezert Gooden, Cypress Eisenmann, Eric and Alex Shores: a daughter-in-law, Lenore Gooden, Knoxville, TN. DeWitt also leaves special Aunts, nieces and nephews. He is preceded in death by two sons, R. Alan Gooden and Gregory D. Gooden, a sister, Sara G. Hammond.

Memorial may be made to Clemson Foundation, DeWitt T. Gooden Scholarship, P O Box 1889, Clemson, South Carolina 29633. You are invited to sign the guestbook at laytonandersonfh.com