John was quite the adventurer and he loved to write. A lot of people use to say he reminded them a lot of Ernest Hemingway. He used to enjoy playing that up whenever he had the chance.

He grew up in Forest Park, Illinois and did the things that most kids his age did, playing baseball in the summer and hockey in the winter. He wasn't always the best student at school, but everyone who knew him back then knows that he was an avid reader. He would read anything he could get his hands on, history, biographies, newspapers, novels and poetry. I think his wide range of reading interests was a preview to his life as an adventurer.

For college, he studied at the University of Montana, where he met his future, and now dearly departed, wife Jane. He worked at the school newspaper, and on weekends, they would go fly-fishing together.

John lived a life full of adventure. He traveled around the world, and the world is a better place for it.