John Martin “Jack” Grant, a guy who I long admired for his great mind and his even greater heart, has passed away at age 46.
He was a TMV Assistant Editor but that was only a small part of who he was. And this is a shocker: if there was news we would not expect to get, it would be about the passing of Jack Grant at such a young age.
It’s not easy to type when tears tumble down, making a keyboard slippery, but here’s what we know so far.
His obit in Tennessee’s Commercial Appeal:
Horn Lake – JOHN MARTIN “Jack” GRANT, 46, died May 26, 2011 at home. He was a member of The American Physical Society, an alumnus of Arizona State University, and a graduate of Southaven High School class of 1982. He was preceded in death by his father, Martin Grant and is survived by his mother, Patricia Grant; brother and sister-in-law, Graham and Mimi Grant; niece, Danielle Grant, nephew, Matt Grant. Hernando Funeral Home (662)429-5260 Brentwoodfuneralservices.com
His bio on TMV’s author page, written by Jack:
Jack Grant (Assistant Editor) has been working in advanced research and development on new materials and processes used in semiconductor integrated circuits since 1991, but he has been blogging only since the end of January, 2003 (a date made memorable because his second blog post was on the breakup of the Space Shuttle Columbia over Texas, where he was located at the time). He began his personal weblog, Random Fate as a way of keeping family and friends updated regarding his impending expatriate assignment in France, but as the date for that relocation moved later and later, his weblog evolved into something beyond his original intent. After a 20 month sojourn as an expatriate in Grenoble, France, Jack returned to the United States in December of 2005 and in the time since has gotten married, in the process gaining two teenage children in addition to a wife, a change that has significantly affected his time available for blogging.
Jack has been granted more than eight US and twelve international patents along with co-authoring over 35 technical papers and a textbook study guide for Physical Science (all under the name of “John M. Grant”). His personal weblog Random Fate is his most significant non-technical writing and has been nominated twice for the Weblog Awards in the “Best of” category for its ranking at the time in the weblog ecosystem. He was the first co-blogger invited to contribute to The Moderate Voice.
In recent years, Jack’s marriage ended, he moved and had begun a career shift.
Here’s what I can tell you about Jack Grant.
Jack was one of a kind.
When I started doing TMV it was clear that due to my travel due to what I do in my other incarnation and other writing projects I could not make the site what I wanted unless I had a coblogger. I invited him because I was a huge fan of Random Fate and of Jacks’ distinct writings and perspective.
I had discovered his weblog that was unlike any other: written from France by someone who had his own way of looking at things. I would email him and encourage him to do more posts on Random Fate when he was in France about living in France and what he saw. I’d link to him every chance I got because I considered him something of a jewel. Jack had his own writing style — his own prism through which he saw life and politics. He had his admirers on the Internet and his not-so-admirers. He didn’t vomit up what he heard on talk radio (I don’t think he listened to it that much) or what other bloggers said. He could care less what I or other people thought. He called things as he saw them and often regretted what he saw on both sides.
He didn’t fit into either political party, was truly scornful of both parties on many occasions, and seemed saddened by how our political culture now works. He preferred to pause and take a long view. He had absolutely no use for spin and was not pleased if he saw an article or blog post offering simplistic statements or polemics on a science-related topic.
I invited him to post what he wanted when he wanted and he instantly made this site (and me) look good. Jack had his own way of thinking things through. I later invited two others as co-bloggers (Michael Stickings and Greg Piper). Jack became one of my best and most loyal Internet friends — a friend I didn’t really spend a ton of time talking to and one who I had never physically met in my life.
Over the years when I had personal concerns, or blog related concerns, Jack would want to know and he’d email me or call me to discuss them with me. I’d joke: “You can send me your psychiatry bill in the morning.” I easily confided in him about what was on my mind. He was great in encouraging me to take a deep breath and keep things in perspective. On TMV, in the days when he blogged, he also offered some of the best ideas on how to run the site and deal with problems that would pop up.
A hugely traumatic event in his life was when his beloved father took sick and he curtailed his life in France to go back and be with his Dad. The second traumatic event was how quickly his father passed away after he left his beloved life in France to return to be with his Dad in Texas. Jack seemed in a state of shock with how quickly his Dad passed.
In recent years, he had a series of personal challenges and diligently, systematically worked on them .He’d email me or call me and apologize for not posting but I understood the many transitions he was undergoing and if there was someone who epitomized credibility to me, it was Jack Grant.
It’s funny so greatly admiring someone who you never really “met.” But Jack was in a special category — one that can never be really filled.
I was, am, and will always be one of Jack Grant’s biggest fans.
In recent years, Jack warned me that with all that was going on posting was difficult. I’d suddenly get a Google Chat pop up on my screen, invariably in the middle of something, almost always at the wrong time and I’d chat with him but had to get off. I gave him my number to call and he did once in a while and I called him once in a while — but we never did call enough given how much we enjoyed each other’s long distance company.
And that points out something none of us should never forget.
This is the second death those of us at the TMV family have experienced: in March TMV Columnist Jerry Remmers died. In these times where passions run high all of us forget what a friend of mine in India years ago called the “sacred self” — that there is more in life than blog posts, and politics, and news stories, and ephemeral arguments.
The people we admire, we like, who are like brothers and sisters to us could be gone in an instant — way sooner than we could ever have dreamed.
Like Jack Grant.
But they will never leave our hearts and minds.
UPDATE: You can now sign an online Guest Book to leave your thoughts, memories and or prayers about Jack Grant.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.