Joe was the son of John and Eliza South Fuller. He had first been married to Eva Wheeler on 8 April 1890 in Toledo. She died of consumption four years later. He then married Mary Ellen Beaupre Wygant in 1898. In April of 1926, Joe, as Perrysburg Town Marshall, served a summons at the mayor's request. At 8 o'clock in the evening, he was returning to his office to fill out the report, when his patrol car was hit by a B & O ((Baltimore & Ohio) freight train killing him instantly. The coroner's inquest decided that Joe had simply not heard or seen the train. His wife, Mary Ellen, died the next year.