Obituaries:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

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JACKSON, ANNE — 79, a former administrative assistant who was known as the "heart and soul" of the Texas Associated Press for three decades, Oct. 7, 2002 in Dallas after a short illness.

Jackson's career with the AP began when the 35-year-old divorced mother of two, wearing a hat and mink stole, entered a Dallas employment agency with dreams of a career in fashion modeling. Two days later, the agency called with a spot at AP.

Jackson walked into the AP office that day in 1958 and ended up staying 33 years. Texas Chief of Bureau John Lumpkin called Jackson "the heart and soul of the Texas AP for more than three decades."

She worked alongside five Texas bureau chiefs. In 1989, she was named an AP staffer of the year, a designation formerly reserved for reporters and photographers. "She was at her best during major breaking news," Lumpkin said. "She'd handle the phones, take dictation and track down off-duty AP staffers to get dispatched to the scene."

Jackson also was remembered for her tireless organizing and bookkeeping on behalf of the Texas Associated Press Managing Editors, a group of executives from the state's daily newspaper members. Survivors include two sons. Daughter-in-law Suzanne Gamboa is the AP's Washington-based Texas regional writer.



JAMIESON, JOSEPH D. — Joseph D. Jamieson, an Associated Press photographer for 43 years, died of pneumonia May 20, 2007 in Rockville, Md., family members said. He was 101.

Jamieson was best known for his coverage of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's White House, the veterans' Bonus Marches of 1932 and the 1937 Mississippi River flood.

Jamieson's photo career began when, as a 17-year-old copy boy for The Washington Post, he was the only one in the newsroom when a fire call came in. He rushed to the scene with a camera and took the first of many sports and feature photographs.

His work for The Post included a front-page photo of formally dressed mourners praying outside Woodrow Wilson's home shortly before the former president's death was announced.

After joining The AP in 1928, Jamieson covered the Coolidge, Hoover and Roosevelt administrations, traveling more than 50,000 miles a year by train with Roosevelt. He also enjoyed covering the national spelling bee every year.

He later became a photo assignment editor, directing coverage of inaugurations and the funeral of President John F. Kennedy. He retired in 1971.

Jamieson was born in Toledo, Ohio, on June 21, 1906, and moved Washington as a boy. He was a scoutmaster for a Bethesda, Md., Boy Scout Troop. His hobbies included woodworking.

His wife of 74 years, Judith Melton Jamieson, died March 1, 2007.

Survivors include two daughters, Judy Lentz, of Bethesda, and Joanne Norris of Santa Barbara, Calif.; and four grandsons.

JEFFERIES, RAYMOND — long-time AP Wirephoto editor in Chicago, died in Elk Grove, Ill., Nov. 19, 2001 after suffering a heart attack. He was 85.

Ray lived in the Chicago area all his life but his job as photo editor had him traveling the world to see that AP members got the best pictures available on any news event. Assignments ranged from Olympic events in Mexico City and Toyko to race riots in Arkansas in the 1950s and for many years, the Kentucky Derby.

Ray joined AP soon after finishing high school during the Great Depression, said his son, Scott.

"He always felt very fortunate to have gotten a job," the son added. "It was one that he loved very much."

After retiring in the early 1980s, Jefferies worked at a golf driving range for the Elk Grove Village Park District and as a courier for the village.

Other survivors include another son, Todd, and three grandchildren.

JESTER, EARLE — former AP correspondent in Boise, Idaho, died March 13, 2000 in Boise. He was 92.

Jester worked for the AP for 35 years, first in Salt Lake City and then as Boise correspondent from 1958 until his retirement in 1972.

He was involved in the creation of the Idaho Election Service, which compiled statewide election results for distribution to news media. A former president of the Idaho Press Club, he received its Newsman's Newsman Award.

After retiring, Jester spent 19 years as a part-time special assistant to Idaho governors Cecil Andrus and John Evans, ghostwriting a weekly commentary for the chief executives that appeared in newspapers throughout the state.

Survivors include a son and a daughter.

JEWELL, HAROLD EDWARD — Retired technical staffer Harold Edward Jewell, who worked for The Associated Press for 39 years, died June 3, 2008 in Richmond Beach, Wash. He was 99. The New York state native joined the AP in Syracuse, N.Y., as an automatic operator in 1935. He moved to Washington state in 1962 and was based in Seattle when he retired in 1974.

Below, read the obituary provided by the family, as published in The Herald newspaper of Everett, Wash.

Harold Jewell was born in Canastoga, New York on March 6, 1909 and passed away peacefully in Richmond Beach, WA on June 3, 2008.

In 1962 Harold moved his family from Syracuse, N.Y., to Edmonds, WA to continue working for the Associated Press, which he did for 39 years.

Over the years he enjoyed raising tropical fish, golfing, bowling, lawn bowling, traveling with his family and playing his beloved ukulele.

He is survived by his wife of 60 years, Peg Jewell; his daughter, Jackie (Jim) Cory; son, Jeff Jewell; and grandsons, Shaugnessy and Logan McCann.

Harold embraced life having a steadfast sense of humor, faith in God and love of family and friends.

Please join us in a celebration of his life at 2:00 p.m., on Saturday, June 28, 2008, at Richmond Beach Rehab Activity Room, 19235 15th Ave. N.W. Shoreline, WA.

In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to your favorite charity.

JOHNSON, BILL — died October 26, 2004 in Oklahoma City, where he had been hospitalized for several weeks. William L. Johnson joined the AP in Richmond. He was correspondent at Memphis and led the coverage of the assassination of Martin Luther King. Later, he was in Oklahoma City.

JOHNSON, BOB — Robert H. "Bob" Johnson, a champion for open government and a former Associated Press executive who during a 42-year career wrote AP's first bulletin on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, has died. He was 84.

After retiring from the news cooperative in 1988, Johnson helped start the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government and made a new career out of fighting for public access to government meetings and records.

Johnson suffered a stroke Saturday morning, Aug. 25, 2007, as he prepared to go to work in Albuerque, N.M., at the foundation, where he served as executive director. He died later that evening.

"He was a workaholic all his life, and was right up to the end," said his wife, Luise Putcamp Johnson.

Paul Stevens, an AP regional vice president who once served as New Mexico's bureau chief said, "I'm among many people in the AP who owe their careers to the mentoring and example that he set in his roles with the AP. I'll really miss him."

A native of Colorado City, Texas, Johnson joined AP in Dallas in 1946 after serving as a U.S. Marine lieutenant in World War II. He was recalled to active duty as a captain in the Korean War.

He was proud of having worked every news job in the Dallas bureau, and became news editor in 1953. The next year, he was named bureau chief in Salt Lake City, managing the Utah and Idaho operations. He was assigned as Indianapolis bureau chief in 1959, then returned to Dallas as Texas bureau chief in 1963.

That year, on Nov. 22, Johnson was in the newsroom of the Dallas Times Herald, adjoining the AP office, when he heard editors talking about an unconfirmed report that President Kennedy had been shot.

UPI, then AP's archrival, had scored a beat on initial reports of the shooting when Merriman Smith grabbed the mobile phone in the pool press car traveling in the president's motorcade and refused to let AP reporter Jack Bell take his turn.

Johnson ran back to his desk, slipped paper in his typewriter, and wrote "BULLETIN" and "DALLAS" and awaited word from his staffers covering Kennedy's visit to call. Wirephoto operator James "Ike" Altgens, who doubled as a photographer, alerted Johnson that he was just 30 feet away from Kennedy when the first shot was fired.

After confirming the facts with Altgens, Johnson turned to his typewriter and wrote the bulletin: "President Kennedy was shot today just as his motorcade left downtown Dallas. Mrs. Kennedy jumped up and grabbed Mr. Kennedy. She cried, 'Oh, no!' The motorcade sped on."

In an interview with the AP in August 2005, Johnson recalled the details of the marathon assassination coverage and how AP had to battle from behind in its coverage, adding with satisfaction, "We got ahead and stayed ahead."

The Kennedy assassination was just one of several major news stories Johnson supervised during his career.

While still in Texas, he oversaw coverage of the Gemini and Apollo space flights from the Houston Space Center.

He moved to New York in 1969 to become AP's sports editor, and in 1972 managed coverage of the massacre of Israeli athletes by Palestinian guerrillas at the Munich Olympics.

Johnson became AP's managing editor the next year, and then moved up to assistant general manager and assistant to the president from 1977 to 1984.

"Bob Johnson was the quintessential AP newsman who thrived on breaking news, the bigger the better," said Mike Silverman, AP's managing editor. "As sports editor and as managing editor, he taught an entire generation of AP journalists the importance of quick, accurate work under deadline pressure, and his lessons were always laced with grace and good humor."

Johnson discovered journalism as a junior in high school.

"It was curiosity. You got to go out watching things happening and tell people about them," he once said.

Louis D. Boccardi, former president and chief executive officer of the AP, said Johnson's "passion for news" played out in his wide-ranging AP career and in his post-AP years battling for the free flow of information.

Johnson "was relentless in pursuit of the news and impatient with obstacles to getting the story his reporters were chasing," Boccardi said.

John Lumpkin, vice president of U.S. newspaper markets for the AP and a former Texas bureau chief, said, "No one in journalism could match Bob for the combination of his wide-ranging experience in news management, his acerbic wit and his ability to charm an after-hours crowd with his impressive singing voice."

Johnson was known for his fine baritone voice and for spontaneously breaking into "Danny Boy" at parties -- including his own retirement party in 1988. An avid hiker, Johnson also would sing "Indian Love Call" during outings.

Johnson moved to Albuquerque as bureau chief in 1984, saying New Mexico was where he wanted to finish his career.

"I think I've done all I can do for either the AP or myself, and I think it's time to step aside and do something new," Johnson said.

In retirement, he was anything but idle. Two years after leaving the AP, he helped found the open government group in New Mexico, and taught reporting and writing at the University of New Mexico and New Mexico State University.

"Bob Johnson was one of the major forces behind the concept of open government in New Mexico," said Attorney General Gary King, who had been working with Johnson on improvements to open meetings and open records laws for the 2008 Legislature.

"I have enjoyed the opportunity of working with him for many years, and will greatly miss him. We'll all have to work hard to preserve his legacy," King said.

Johnson is survived by his wife; a son, R.H. Johnson of New York; five daughters, Luise Robin Poulton of Salt Lake City, Jan Leah Tapia of Albuquerque, Stephanie Neale Niketic of Newburyport, Mass., Jennifer Anne Robyn of Monroe, Conn., and Ann Tapia Johnson of Salt Lake City; son-in-law Novak Niketic; four grandsons and three granddaughters; and a brother, Richard S. Johnson of Denver.

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Aug. 31, 2007

Former AP executive remembered as crusader for open government

By DEBORAH BAKER
Associated Press Writer

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) -- Robert H. "Bob" Johnson, a former Associated Press executive, is being remembered as a gifted newsman, a no-nonsense Marine and a passionate crusader for open government in New Mexico.

Johnson died Saturday at age 84, following a stroke he suffered earlier in the day.

He retired in 1988 after a 42-year career with the AP directing coverage of stories that included the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the massacre of Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics and the Gemini and Apollo space flights.

"He was a staffers' boss -- a straight-shooter who defined integrity," said AP reporter Matt Mygatt, who worked for Johnson in Albuquerque.

Journalists, lawyers and public officials -- including New Mexico Attorney General Gary King and former Gov. David Cargo -- were among those who gathered Thursday to remember Johnson at a service at Sandia Presbyterian Church.

Mike Silverman, AP's managing editor, said Johnson had a hand in some of the most important stories of the last 50 years.
"Whatever the story was, he showed the same calm, determined demeanor," Silverman said.

Johnson helped start the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government and was its executive director when he died.
A familiar figure in the state Capitol, Johnson worked to make government at all levels more accessible and accountable to New Mexicans.

"No one had more energy than Bob. No one was there earlier than Bob. No one was there later than Bob," said Pat Rogers, an Albuquerque lawyer and former FOG president who lobbied the state Legislature with Johnson.

Johnson worked with the state attorney general's office on seminars around New Mexico, helping public officials understand what the law requires of them.

He fought to make copies of public records affordable and to keep investment records and other state documents open. He tried to shed more light on the process of hiring public officials, from city managers to university presidents.

One victory eluded him: persuading the Legislature to open its conference committees -- where lawmakers reconcile differing versions of bills -- to the public.

Mourners also recalled Johnson as an avid hiker with a keen interest in botany, a singer with a fine baritone voice and a native Texan with a penchant for cowboy boots.

"Dad lived from a sense of adventure and a sense of duty," said his son R.H. Johnson of New York City.

"To people close to him, he imparted the joy and romance of life and the high stakes of integrity. We mourn our loss," he said.

Johnson, who was born in Colorado City, Texas, served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Marines in World War II and was recalled to active duty as a captain in the Korean War.

During Thursday's service, the choir -- to which Johnson had belonged -- sang the marching song "Stout-hearted Men," and Marine officers presented an American flag to Johnson's wife of 63 years, Luise Putcamp Johnson.

Bob Johnson joined AP in Dallas in 1946. During his four decades of service, he was bureau chief in Dallas, Salt Lake City and Indianapolis. He worked as the news cooperative's sports editor, managing editor, assistant general manager and assistant to the president before moving to Albuquerque as bureau chief in 1984.

Silverman recounted Johnson's written description of an April night in 1974 in the New York bureau when three big, national stories broke simultaneously and Johnson, as managing editor, was in charge.

"It was one of those electric nights -- the news breaking all around, the atmosphere crackling with intense competitive urgency," Johnson wrote. "Everybody pitched in. It was like a great ball team in a big game, or a great opera company on the night of a triumphal performance."

Additional survivors include five daughters, seven grandchildren and a brother.

JOHNSON, CURTIS LEE — CWA retiree, died October 4, 2004.

JOHNSON, THOMAS E. — who reported for several Texas newspapers and the AP, died May 13, 1999 in Dallas. He was 65.

Johnson began his newspaper career at the Amarillo Globe-News, where his father was managing editor. He joined the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal in 1961 and worked later in AP bureaus in Austin and Washington.

He worked for The Dallas Morning News from 1968 to 1973 when he left to work as a free-lance writer. He later taught computer programming. He retired earlier in 1999.

Survivors include a son, a daughter and two sisters.

JONES, DWIGHT LAMBERT — Longtime Portland, Ore., broadcast editor Dwight Jones, died Oct. 31, 2003 at a hospital in Newport, Ore,. 23 years after he retired to the Oregon Coast. He was 88.

Jones mentored most of a generation of much younger staffers, some of who went on to foreign or other AP careers and didn't realize for years how right ``the old coot,'' as he called himself, usually was.

Jones lived in South Beach just south of Newport on the central coast.

He was born Dec. 16, 1914, in Kamas, Utah, and raised in Metropolis, Nev., and Salt Lake City, Utah.

He attended Utah State Agricultural College, Logan, Utah, and the University of Utah, Salt Lake City, where he was editor of the student paper, the Utah Chronicle.

He went to work as a reporter for the Ogden Standard-Examiner in February 1937 and married his wife Norma that April in the Salt Lake City Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

He volunteered for military service in 1942 and was a glider pilot.

Before joining The AP in 1948 he was assistant city editor for the Salt Lake Telegram, a news writer at KDYL Radio and at a weekly newspaper in Blythe, Calif.

He joined the AP in Salt Lake City and transferred to Portland in 1968. He retired in 1980 as broadcast editor.

Survivors include his wife, Norma; two daughters, Sandra Bruening and Karen Frantz; two sons, Jonathan Jones and Jeffery Jones; 22 grandchildren; and 31 great-grandchildren.

JONES, GARTH — an Associated Press reporter who chronicled Texas governors, political scandal, space exploration and tragedy during a 40-year career with the news agency, Jan. 18, 2006, in Austin, Texas, of pneumonia. He was 88.

His career began at the Abilene Reporter-News in 1938 in an era when reporters relied on typewriters, scissors and rubber cement. By the time he retired in 1987, he had covered Texas governors from Beauford Jester, Allan Shivers to Bill Clements.

"Garth was the consummate professional, never failing to be a gentleman but never failing to pursue the news," said Mike Holmes, former AP Austin correspondent who worked with Jones. "His advice and counsel was always welcomed by those of us who covered the Capitol."

Friends and family say he enjoyed writing about Texas politicians as much as he enjoyed drinking with them. Jones was one of several reporters who created the Old Fitz Club, named for the bourbon they used to make Old Fashioneds.

In 1966, Jones brought readers the story of Charles Whitman's deadly shooting rampage by taking notes as he crouched behind parked cars to evade flying bullets on the University of Texas campus. Whitman opened fire from the top of the university tower, killing more than a dozen people before he was shot by a police officer.

Jones was on a team of AP reporters at the NASA Space Center in Houston tasked with telling the world that Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon. Jones would later call it the biggest story of his career.

Colleagues said Jones always treated the subjects of his stories with respect and never lost his quiet, dry sense of humor.

"Garth was a calm presence in the bedlam that often marked Texas politics while he directed the AP's Capitol report. He was honest, fair and objective," said John Lumpkin, AP's vice president/business operations for U.S. Newspaper Markets who was AP's Texas bureau chief for two decades.

JONES, THOMAS E. (GENE) — long-time AP automatics operator and technician, died Dec. 26 in Birmingham, AL . He was 82.

Jones went to work with AP in Memphis in 1948. He later transferred to Cincinnati as an operator-attendant before moving to Birmingham as a technician.

Born in Mulberry, TN, he went on disability about a year after undergoing back surgery. He retired in 1974. In recent years, a diagnosis of leukemia led to numerous blood transfusions and he began receiving chemotherapy last year.

Jones and Ethelyn Nelson were married June 3, 1968. Other survivors include two stepdaughters and two grandchildren.

JOSEPH, HELEN — retired Special Features editorial assistant, died May 22, 1999 at age 76, in Brooklyn, NY.

Joseph joined the AP in 1963 as a stenographer. She worked for many years in AP Newsfeatures, doing typesetting and other production work. She retired earlier this spring. Before AP, she worked at Cooper Union and the Internal Revenue Service.

JOSTEN, RUDI — Rudi Josten, who covered the rise of Adolf Hitler for The Associated Press and went on to build the news agency's German-language service after World War II, died Dec. 31, 2006 in Germany, his daughter said. He was 99.

Rudolf E. Josten was born in Berlin in 1907 and began working for the AP in 1925.

As head of the agency's German photo service from 1935 to 1939, he accompanied Hitler's motorcade as the dictator swept into Austria in 1938 at the time of its annexation by Nazi Germany.

In 1939, he switched to the news side of the wire service and worked there until 1941, when the Nazis closed AP's local operations after Germany declared war on the United States.

Josten spent the war years monitoring shortwave news broadcasts from abroad for the German news agency Transozean. He resumed work for the AP shortly before the war ended in May, 1945.

In 1973, German President Gustav W. Heinemann awarded Josten the Verdienstkreuz, or Cross of Merit, first class, for his work in journalism.