My condolences to all of you. Jon was an incredible man, who accomplished so much. There would be no Clinica Yanamono without him. I am heading back to peru on Jan 5, through the end of the month, then should be around for the next few months. I will be watching for a memorial service. Jerry and I would like to attend.
0
Jon was fun to travel and explore places with. Everything was interesting to him, whether a piece of land up the shore, an isolated lake on a county road in Wisconsin, my farm in southern Minnesota or a villa in Tuscany. He didn’t bat an eye driving on the opposite side of the street in London. And he didn’t ask me why I was cautioning a herd of British country sheep to be careful not to contract Mad Cow Disease, which was rampant at the time.
He danced to classical music in his downtown office as easily as he danced improvised jazz music Saturday afternoons at the Club Saratoga.
He appreciated the smell of tomato leaves rubbed between his fingers, the thrill of hunting chanterelles in the late summer, and the taste of a well-aged Scotch whisky.
His heart called him to be of service to his fellow man. Knowing him invariably made a positive and lasting impression on those of us who had the honor to have enjoyed his friendship.
0
I was so sad to hear the news that Jon had passed away. Sending love to Paul, his entire family and his dear friends. The world lost one of the good ones. I remember Jon had such an adventurous spirit! I have such great memories of drives up the north shore with him and my mom where we'd trespass on special back roads to see an architectural marvel, or what he speculated was Schwarzenegger's house, or an old military site. I was the kid in the backseat, but not some rebellious 20-something, I was the nervous one! but those adventures seared in my brain. Like wow, this curiosity for life and taking the adventurous path is a choice. Jon traveled with our family to London and he was instantly at home there, or Italy, or driving up the California coast. Anywhere we went he was fearless. And he understood the most important aspect of travel: having a great sense of humor when stuff goes wrong (which of course it does). I also remember Christmas holidays we got to celebrate with him, my mom bringing out the vodka shot service, we'd had a fire going, and eventually the stories would start up, about his drive across the USSR, or Finish jokes, or history lessons. I loved it, he was such a cool model of what an artsy successful adult could be. He took me under his wing for a month and let me join some of his architecture meetings so I could learn. I knew he knew I didn't know much, but he always treated me with respect. And talked to me like a peer. Our family has so many stories, I hope they all start to flow as all the memories come back and we celebrate the life he had. He was absolutely an inspiration. Brilliant mind. Iconic (with that ever present pen in the shirt pocket). And a total joy to be around. Feel lucky I got to know him as a young person and learn about the kind of adult to be. Thanks for letting me share a story here.
0
I first met Jon in 1992 when he and Joe Leek bounded off an airplane at the airport in Iquitos, Peru. I am a Wisconsin-born, Wisconsin-trained physician who had taken a trip to see the rainforest, and decided to abandon my practice in Wisconsin and take care of the people living near the ecotourism lodge where I first visited Peru. Jon had heard me on a public radio interview a few months earlier, had decided I might constitute a project for him to organize, and convinced his Rotary Club to raise the funds to send him and Dr. Leek to meet me and see what, if anything, I was doing. They spent a week evaluating my work. Joe watched me work with patients and held a flashlight and offered sage advice as I did so. Jon examined local methods of construction and looked at the small room, lit by a kerosene lamp, where I was taking care of patients. On their last day there, Jon sat on the bed which served as exam table, and it fell through, termites having weakened the support holding the boards on which the mattress rested. They decided that I was in fact a doctor, and that there was in fact a need for a better working space for me.
This led to the construction of the Clinica Yanamono on the banks of the Amazon River in 1993, a project fully organized and authored by Jon, who did everything from being the architect designing the structure, to organizing the work crew, to arranging for travel and lodging for the Rotarians and making contact with local Peruvian Rotarians, to raising the funds to make it all happen. And when that clinic threatened to fall into the river, which had eaten the land on which it stood, he repeated the feat in 2009 to build the second iteration of the clinic, on the banks of Quebrada Yanamono, a small tributary flowing into the Amazon.
As of this writing, the clinic has tended to over 76,000 patients, all of whom live along the banks of the Amazon River, all of whom are poor, and most of whom have little other access to medical care. Without Jon, this never would have been possible. Thank you, Jon.
0
2009, Building new Amazon Clinic
Great minds contemplating
0
1993, Building Amazon Clinic
Jon and crew on floor of new clinic
0
Share with others
