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John K. Birch Silver Spring, MD QCWA # 29423 OOTC # 3747 |
John K. Birch, 87, loving husband of the late June Shattuck of Stovertown, Ohio, died on October 4, 2011 at his daughter´s home in Connecticut.
Mr. Birch, son of Ernest Noah and Pauline Kaley Birch and brother of the late Robert Birch, was born on April 5, 1924 in Elyria, Ohio, where his British-born father was manager of the Elyria Lace Factory for many years.
From an early age, John was a skilled technical designer. John earned his Bachelor´s degree from Ohio State University. While in the U.S. Navy, he was an electronics technician´s mate in Guam and the Phillipines between 1944-1946, experiences that ensured that he would never lose his mastery of Morse Code.
John married June Shattuck in the St. John´s Lutheran Church in Stovertown in May of 1945. The couple, who had met at dance class at OSU, lived in several places during their life together, including San Antonio, Texas, where two daughters, Nancy Anne and Carol Sue, were born; and Quincy, Illinois, where a son, John Douglas, was born. They also returned frequently to the farm that was the ancestral home of June´s parents, Nina and Wallace Shattuck.
Mr. Birch's interest in electronics engineering served both him and his country well. At the age of 16, he was one of the youngest citizens ever to hold a ham radio operator license (call letters: W3JB), a passion that he continued into his 80s as a resident of Leisure World's active ham radio club in Silver Spring, Maryland. In the 1960s, the Voice of America recruited John Birch to its broadcast division, where he designed the VOA's entire communications control panel, following his installation of the sound system at Rockefeller Plaza in NYC. John´s work for the VOA took him to 45 countries and 6 continents where he oversaw the design of satellites and installation of satellite-tracking systems that were integral to U. S. communications during the Cold War era. Mr. Birch was also the author of numerous patents and a collector of antique radio memorabilia, as well as modern gadgetry.
During his long life, John Birch became famous for his wit, his talent as a wordsmith, his love of good books (in later years, he was never without his tiny MP3 player), and his enjoyment of James Thurber and of music -- both classical and modern jazz. He was also a passionate sailor whose boat (a Nonesuch) named the "Puffin" sailed in 2000 from the Chesapeake in Maryland to the New York harbor with son John Douglas as first mate for nearly 3 weeks.
He will be greatly missed by family and friends.
Services will be at 11:00 am on Saturday, October 8 at St. John's Lutheran Church on route 555 in Stovertown, with burial at the church cemetery.
Memorial contributions may be made to the National Audubon Society or the American Cancer Society.
(Source: www.zanesvilletimesrecorder.com)