Jon Edward Ahlquist, 1944–2020

Jon Edward Ahlquist died on May 7, 2020, at the age of 75. Thirty years ago, Jon was one of the most famous ornithologists in the world, co-recipient of the 1988 Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal from the National Academy of Sciences and winner of the 1983 Edward’s Prize from the Wilson Ornithological Society. He was also an outstanding bird watcher, artist, and photographer. Yet few ornithologists ever met Jon, let alone knew him as a colleague or friend. He rarely attended American Ornithologists’ Union (AOU) or other scientific meetings, he was not an Elective Member or Fellow of the AOU, and he disappeared from mainstream academia in 1994, only to reemerge in 2017 as a scientific spokesperson for Creationism (https://creation.com/jon-ahlquist). Even for those of us who knew him, Jon was largely an enigma, in many ways open and giving but in others private and almost mysterious. We all realized, however, that Jon was a brilliant intellectual with an encyclopedic knowledge of birds, art, classical music, language, food, photography, and more. He could be hysterically funny, shockingly profane, and outrageous in dress and lifestyle. Although he played a pioneering role in the development of molecular systematics, no one outside a small circle of colleagues knew what he actually did because he never promoted himself publicly and was completely overshadowed and dominated by his mentor and partner of 28 years, Charles G. Sibley. Jon was born on July 27, 1944, the only child of Lula and Arvid Ahlquist. He was raised speaking Finnish in Ashtabula, Ohio, on the edge of Lake Erie, where he developed his bird watching and artistic skills. He had a major showing of his paintings at age 14 and published his first paper (a breeding bird census) at 16. At Ashtabula High School Jon was president of the National Honor Society, editor of the school newspaper, art editor for the yearbook, and valedictorian. Upon graduation, in 1962, he headed to Cornell, drawn not only to its ornithology program but also by Cornell’s historic role in American bird art. Upon arrival, Jon found himself rubbing elbows with such illustrious undergraduates as James Brown and Douglas Futuyma, and postgrads Alan Brush, Joanna Burger, Kendall Corbin, Herb Hendrickson, and Neal Smith. As soon as he arrived, Jon sought out Charles Sibley, who was at that time a renowned professor of zoology. His arrival in Sibley’s lab was described in a 2011 email from Neal Smith to Kevin Winker: