Jonathan was indeed (as Art so aptly put it) a hard man to know. But his emotional depths as a person, which he rarely shared in conversation, are ever so evident in the songs he wrote and recorded. I'm eternally grateful to Sandy and Caroline for recording them. My personal favorites: "Laurel," a gentle love song written for a friend of mine to whom I introduced Jonathan during one Getaway weekend and with whom Jonathan became hopelessly smitten; "Lament for a Red Planet," written when Jonathan became hopelessly smitten by Mars when he was covering NASA's Mars explorer mission for Science News; and the "Winnie the Pooh Rag," a delightfully silly tumble of words that always, always makes me grin when I hear it.

His work with the Boarding Party--and those liner notes Art raved about--was a showcase not only for Jonathan's prodigious musical talents, but for his dogged persistence in finding (and finding out about) really wonderful, unusual songs. I still remember his excitement at discovering the oyster dredger song from the Chesapeake Bay (and his tireless search for recipes for the "corndog" and "sourbelly" mentioned in the song), or at meeting the descendant of the C&O Canal lock-keeper whose song the group was going to record, or at finding and arranging the breathtaking version of "Go Down You Blood Red Roses" that the group first performed for an FSGW event way back when. When Jonathan was excited, you couldn't help but be excited with him. And those meticulous research notes (with lots of organizing help from folks like Nancy King and Mia Gardiner)provide a roadmap to Jonathan's journey of discovery that the rest of us can share.

On a personal note, Jonathan (along with Helen Schneyer)took me, a Midwestern girl new to the big city, under his wing when I first came to Washington in February 1976. He introduced me to Orpheus Records, to sushi and sake, to his friend (and now mine) Pete the Spy, to Japanese woodblock prints, to the hottest Indian food I've ever had, to cutthroat wordplay..... His interests were wide and varied, and he delighted in sharing them. His generosity was great. Like Chance, I received gifts I treasure from Jonathan. A beautiful Japanese teapot, an appliqued cushion with a whale on it that I still use every day.

And then there are the famous "Jonathan" stories. I'd guess everyone who knew him has at least one. He once set a friend's hair on fire at a party at Helen Schneyer's house; it wasn't intentional. He was making his famous Enewetak drink recipe (named after the atoll where the U.S. conducted nuclear tests), which called for flaming the concoction, a gazillion-proof mixture of several different liquors and brandies. The alcoholic fumes were so intense that when a match was lighted a couple of feet away, the fumes jumped from the pot on top of the stove and flambeed Kit's hair. He was at the center of many crazy times.

I hope that Jonathan has found the "rest and sweet peace of mind" he wrote about in "Life's Trolley Ride."
Kathy