Jackson (“Jack”) was born on January 3, 1932, in Baltimore, Maryland, the oldest of three boys. The family remained in Baltimore for six more years while his father, Alexander, completed a PhD in English at Johns Hopkins University, and embarked on a teaching career. His mother, Mildred, taught piano and was a concert pianist. The family followed an itinerant academic’s path among university towns and extended visits with relatives (the latter in St. Petersburg, Florida). Jack attended elementary school in Bryan, Texas; he graduated from high school in Norman, Oklahoma, and then from the University of Oklahoma, with a bachelor’s degree in history. While an undergraduate, Jack worked at the university library. Thus began his love of archival work, which stayed with him the rest of his life.
Jack completed ROTC and officer training at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, and was commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the United States Army. He served in the Army Reserves and National Guard for many years, primarily as an air defense artillery instructor, and retired as a Lieutenant Colonel. Jack was proud of his service. For his children, there was no sight quite like their father returning home from weeks away at camp, tall and strong in his khakis and peaked cap.
Post-graduation, Jack's first job was Director of College Archives at Radcliffe College in Cambridge, MA. There, he met Dorothy (Dottie) Brisson, who was living and working in Newburyport, MA. They married in 1958 and moved to Annapolis, Maryland, where Jack began his next job as an archivist for the Maryland Hall of Records. They settled in a farmhouse in Edgewater, where they lived for almost sixty years.
Jack obtained a master’s degree in public administration from American University, and until his retirement in 1996, held several positions with the State of Maryland, including grant analyst for the Board of Trustees of State Colleges and thirty years as a budget analyst for the Department of Transportation. Throughout this time, Jack often worked a second job (in addition to his part-time military service), including over fifty years as an adjunct professor and tutor at Anne Arundel Community College, where he taught courses in management, communications, English, and writing; finally, at age 84, Jack tutored his last group of students in basic paragraph writing, admitting he had reached his fill of subject-verb disagreement.
Jack loved to say that fortune smiled upon him when Dottie decided to marry him. They were unusual soulmates, loquacious New Englander and reserved Southern gentleman, but they shared a deep commitment to their faith (and particularly, to St. Mary’s Church in Annapolis), and they centered their lives on their children; they worked hard and sacrificed. In 2016, Jack and Dottie moved to an independent senior living community in Durham, NC. Jack was devastated when Dottie died in 2018, their fifty-ninth year of marriage.
After Dottie's death, Jack took up painting and drawing and became more social in his new environment. His dear friend Gennie Putnam was important. Jack’s reputation among his friends was as a smart, smiling, and kind man, quick with a story about his childhood in Texas. To Dottie and his children, he was loving, stoic, tireless, and steadfast, a devoted husband and father.
Jack was preceded in death by his parents, Mildred and Alexander Saunders, and by his brother, Richard Saunders. He is survived by brother Charles Saunders and children Barry (and spouse Susan), Lexey (and spouse Michael Esposito), and Jeb (and spouse Molly Mullin); grandchildren, Eleanor and Haley Saunders, Michael Esposito, and Frances and Dorothy Mullin-Saunders; nephews Rick and John Saunders; and many nieces and nephews from the Brisson side of the family.
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to St. Mary's Church in Annapolis (https://www.stmarysannapolis.org/church-homepage). For those wishing to share in a celebration of Jack’s life, please, within the next three weeks, share your email address with Lexey at [email protected].
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