John S. Brown was driven by an unquenchable curiosity.
It led him to devise new ways of packaging motor oil, help develop plastic explosives during World War II, keep an amateur radio in the laundry room, enjoy air shows in Wisconsin, scuba dive in Hawaii and read every book in the Flossmoor Public Library that interested him.
Mr. Brown, 83, of Flossmoor, died Wednesday, April 10, of complications related to Alzheimer’s disease in Hartsfield Village in Munster, Ind.
Born in Chicago, Mr. Brown grew up believing he could learn anything he needed from books. He worked his way through the University of Chicago as a handyman at an apartment building, graduating in 1942 with a bachelor’s degree in chemistry. During World War II he worked on explosives at DuPont in Clinton, Ind. In 1943, he married June Evelyn Tribble.
For more than 35 years, he worked as a chemist and a packaging engineer for Standard Oil Co. of Indiana, which became Amoco Oil Co., contributing to more than 30 federal patents, said his son, John. Among them was a lubricating oil that allowed steel to be cast cleanly and continuously, inspired by workers grousing about having to clean equipment in a steel plant he toured one day.
He once told his son: “The most important thing you can be is flexible.”
An avid science fiction fan, he held an enduring fascination for the natural and scientific world. For a time he concocted insecticides and would take his kids to marvel at the jumbo cockroaches he kept in his lab.
During the week, he would bring home industrial curiosities, such as stress-tested ball bearings. On Saturdays, he frequented Chicago museums. His family was the first on the block to have seat belts, which he bought and installed by bolting them into holes he drilled in the floor of his 1952 Chevrolet.
His vacations consisted of elaborate road trips through the Western U.S. to admire cliffs and craters, with the occasional detour to appreciate the turbines at Hoover Dam, according to his daughter Joy Brown Nitti.
“We never went to Disneyland. But any forest preserve, anything like that, we were welcome,” she said.
Though shy around groups, Mr. Brown was warm in more personal settings. He long dedicated himself to civil service and was a member of the Alpha Phi Omega national service fraternity.
He served as civil defense director for Flossmoor and the south suburbs in the 1950s and early 1960s. He kept a tractor-sized gasoline generator in the garage. Intended for defense emergencies, the generator also would be fired up when the power was out, so neighborhs could eat hot meals and watch TV.
He was a 32nd degree Mason and a member of the Scottish Rite Temple.
Along with his wife, son and daughter, Mr. Brown is also survived by another daughter, June Evelyn Brown DiPiazza; and nine grandchildren. Services will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday in Flossmoor Community Church, Hutchinson Road and Carroll Parkway.
