Professor Emeritus Alan H. Brush, 91, of Stonington, an evolutionary biologist who specialized in feather proteins and taught generations of students during 30 years in the Department of Physiology and Neurobiology, died on July 12 after a brief hospitalization for ischemic stroke.
Alan was a creative researcher and lab director in molecular biology whose interest in the evolution of feathers led to 70 scientific papers and book chapters. His interests in science were broad, and he was extremely well read, including publication of about 150 book reviews. He edited Volume X of Chemical Zoology and, with UConn Professor George Clark, the centenary volume Perspectives in Ornithology for the American Ornithologists Union. He brought broad-minded discernment to scholarly publication for 10 years as editor of The Auk, the former journal of the American Ornithologists’ Union, and for 3 years as editor of CBE Views, published by the Council of Biological Editors. He was 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, doctoral and post-doctoral advisor, as well as an informative and charismatic speaker in the lecture hall, at professional meetings of scientific societies, and on river and ocean voyages co-organized by the Museum of Natural History in New York and Discovery Tours. Adventure in retirement included a 2000-2001 voyage aboard a 33 ft sailboat, “Mokita,” with his wife Mary Jane Brush from Maine south to the Florida Keys. Part of the voyage was retracing 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).
Alan was born in Rochester, New York, on September 29, 1934, to Martin and Rebecca Elizabeth “Betty” Brush (nee Trott). He grew up in Los Angeles 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 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 he held a post-doctoral appointment at the Cornell Ornithology Lab. Alan cheered college football and men’s and women’s basketball for both the Trojans and Bruins as well as the UConn Huskies.
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. He will be missed by all.
There will be a Celebration of Life at “The Hounds” in Stonington, (https://www.thehoundsstonington.com/) on Thursday, August 13, gathering 11:30 am and service at noon. Donations in Alan’s memory may be directed toward Pittsburgh’s Reconstructionist Congregation Dor Hadash (here or https://www.dorhadash.net/donations), where daughter Lisa is a long-time member, for tikkun olam – repair of the world – after the mass shooting on October 27, 2018.
