Sam was the son of Calvin Duff and Nancy Elizabeth Murphy Duff, two large families in Polk County. He was born in Ace, Texas, a small community located south of the city of Livingston. He was number fourteen of fourteen children, which included ten boys and 4 girls.

Sam lost his father at the early age of 5 years old, so he was very close to his mother until she died in 1966.

He was married to Muriel Dean Jones on March 29, 1947 in Livingston, Texas. They were the parents of three children, Elizabeth Joy, Charles Norman and Susan Ann.

Sam worked many jobs during his lifetime and wore many hats. He worked as a rough neck in the oil fields of East Texas, a land & timber surveyor, a Texas Fish & Wildlife Service government trapper in the Rio Grande Valley, a longshoreman and a city employee of Deer Park, Texas. After retirement he truck farmed on his farm in Livingston, Texas.

He was an avid fisherman and hunter and loved being out in the great outdoors with his family and friends. He loved passing on his knowledge of fishing and hunting to his grandchildren and great grandchildren. He loved to talk about his growing up years, how things were and the pranks he and his brothers pulled on one another. He never met a stranger and was a big talker who loved reminicing about growing up in East Texas. Sam was a big cut-up and loved making his family laugh with his antics no matter where he was.

He enjoyed taking vacation trips with his kids especially to Yellowstone National Park and Rocky Mountain National Park because of all the animals he got to see. He was always ready to go whenever a trip was planned and enjoyed every moment of them.

He had a deep love for his wife and family and never missed telling them "I love you."

He last few years were spent fighting a lot of illnesses which kept him from his favorite passtime of driving around, visiting his old friends and just getting out and seeing the East Texas countryside that he loved so much.

When he passed away in December 2005, he was the last surviving child of his family.

Sam was the proud grandfather to twelve children and the great-grandfather to twelve children at the time of his death. Since that time he has become the great-grandfather to five additional babies: twin girls born in 2009, a grandson born in 2010 and twin grandson and granddaughter in 2011.