Dr. Alan H. Brush
BRUSH: Dr. Alan H. Brush, of Stonington, Connecticut, an evolutionary biologist who specialized in feather proteins and taught generations of pre-med, nursing and allied health students during 30 years as professor at the University of Connecticut-Storrs, died on Sunday, July 12 (28 Tamuz 5786), after a brief hospitalization for ischemic stroke. Alan was born in Rochester, New York, on September 29, 1934, to Martin and Rebecca Elizabeth “Betty” Brush (née Trott). He grew up in Los Angeles, California, with his younger brother, the late Richard (Sharlene) Brush, and was educated in LA public schools and at the University of Southern California. His Army service included work tracking the persistence of radiation fallout for the Atomic Energy Project, at the then-new UCLA campus facility for nuclear medicine and at the Mercury, Nevada, test site. His graduate degrees in zoology were both conferred by UCLA, and Alan cheered college football and men’s and women’s basketball for both the Trojans and Bruins as well as the UConn Huskies. He held a post-doctoral appointment at the Cornell Ornithology Lab. Alan was a creative researcher and lab director in molecular biology whose interest in the evolution of feathers involved him as a member of the “Dream Team” that visited China in 1997 to study the then-recently discovered fossils of feathered dinosaurs. He was a caring and supportive colleague and doctoral and post-doctoral adviser as well as an informative and charismatic speaker — in the lecture hall, at professional meetings of scientific societies, on board voyages co-organized by the Museum of Natural History in New York and Discovery Tours, and at the Mystic Historical Association. He brought broad-minded discernment to editing The Auk and the Council of Biological Editors Views. Adventures in retirement included a 2000-2001 voyage aboard their 33-foot sailboat Mokita, with his wife Mary Jane Brush, sailing from Maine south to the Florida Keys. Part of the voyage retraced the path of the early naturalist Mark Catesby. They examined the state of nature then and now and published a volume with Alan’s words and Mary Jane’s watercolors (M.J. Brush and Alan H. Brush. 2018. “Mark Catesby’s Legacy: Natural History Then and Now,” The Catesby Commemorative Trust.). Among Alan’s many superpowers was a life-long talent for forming and maintaining loving friendships. He was generous, thoughtful and curious, qualities that drew people of all ages and walks of life to him all the way from high school through a long and productive retirement. Alan had a fundamentally happy disposition and amplified joy in the lives of family, neighbors, friends, colleagues and members of many communities. Alan is survived and celebrated by his wife of 37 years, Mary Jane (née Spring) Brush of Stonington, Connecticut; his first wife, Nancy (née Carter) Rohner of Storrs, Connecticut; his children, Dr. Lisa (Olivia Bloechl) Brush of Pittsburgh, Matthew (Nicole Skoda) Brush of Wilton, Connecticut, Christopher (Gail) Gallo of Chaplin, Connecticut, and Matthew Gallo of Breckinridge, Colorado; a cousin, Dr. Ruth Messinger; three nieces and four nephews; and four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren, to whom he was a patient, gentle and loving Pops. There will be a Celebration of Life at “The Hounds” in Stonington, Connecticut, (thehoundsstonington.com) on Thursday, Aug. 13, gathering at 11:30 a.m. and service at noon. Donations in Alan’s memory can be directed toward Pittsburgh’s Reconstructionist Congregation Dor Hadash (dorhadash.net/donations), where daughter Lisa is a long-time member, for tikkun olam — repair of the world — after the mass shooting on Oct. 27, 2018. PJC
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