John Wulsin Obituary

John Hager Wulsin Jr. left his body at 8:30am, Wednesday, December 4th, 2024, at his home in Wimberley, Texas, in the presence of family, eight months after receiving a diagnosis for metastatic cancer of the brain and spine. He was born on October 7th, 1949 to Rosamond Reed Wulsin and John Hager Wulsin in Cincinnati, Ohio. He was raised in Cincinnati, with his four siblings, living from the ages of 3-5 in Japan. As a young boy he enjoyed the best laughter of his life with friend and accomplice Reppy Pogue. At the age of fourteen, he attended Le Rosey School in Switzerland with his younger brother Lawson, becoming fluent in French. He returned to the United States to complete his high school education at Groton School in Massachusetts. After Groton, he attended Harvard University, where he played goalie for the Junior Varsity hockey team as a freshman and sophomore. He dropped out of Harvard during his sophomore year seeking adventure in a yellow school bus, which he and his childhood friend Chris Chatfield turned into a mobile home in the spirit of the Merry Pranksters. The school bus broke down somewhere near Hudson Bay, and he spent the next years teaching at the Hurricane Island Outward Bound School on the coasts and waters of Maine, and in the Austrian Alps, where he became fluent in German. As a young man in his early 20's he was already aware that teaching was his life's calling. En route to Kenya to continue his work with Outward Bound, he stopped at Emerson College in England to visit his high school friend, Ben Bingham, who was studying anthroposophy there. He was so taken with the depth and scope of what he found at Emerson that he decided to stay and take up his own study of anthroposophy and to train as a Waldorf teacher with Francis Edmunds and others. There he met friend and future colleague, David Sloan, stomping and clowning through a Eurythmy class.

After two years at Emerson College, he returned to Harvard to finish his B.A. in English, where he studied with Northrop Frye, and met his first wife, Alice Barton, mother of his two children. He taught high school English at Connecticut prep schools for a few years to prepare himself for becoming a Waldorf teacher. At Hamden Hall, he met his colleague and lifelong friend, Bruce Coffin, the person he most enjoyed conversation with throughout his adult life. His daughter Lara was born in 1979 in New Haven, CT.

In 1980, John was invited to teach high school English and Drama at Green Meadow Waldorf school in Spring Valley, NY, where he taught until his retirement 35 years later. His son Seth was born in Spring Valley in 1981. John's influence on Green Meadow and the broader community was profound, and he was loved and revered by generations of students, colleagues, and parents. He directed and co-directed (with David Sloan from Eurythmy class) dozens of plays in his time at Green Meadow. His main lesson course on Moby Dick was legendary, as were his scintillating explorations of Dante's Inferno, The Brothers Karamazov, the American Transcendentalists, Parsifal, and the Bible as literature. His deeper mission as a teacher was to help his students develop the individual self to move as freely as possible through the world. He was valued and respected by his colleagues for his integrity, his dedication to consensus, his commitment to listening, and his technique of occasional naps during faculty meetings to tap the oneiric wells for inspiration and guidance. He was sometimes mistaken for Groucho Marx when seen from afar, briefcase in hand, speed-walking across the school courtyard on a forward lean.

In 1987 he received his M.A. in literature from Columbia University for his work with James Joyce's Finnegans Wake. In 1987 he married his teaching colleague and second wife, Jane Johnson, with whom he shared 37 years of dedicated matrimony. In 2004, they spent a sabbatical year studying Spanish and traveling through Guatemala, Peru, Chile, and Spain among other countries with their grandson, Knut. John and Jane shared countless other adventures together over the years, and spent time each summer on the beloved waters of the North Channel, in Ontario, Canada.

John taught poetics for many years at the School of Eurythmy in Spring Valley NY, and taught aspiring Waldorf teachers at Sunbridge College in New York, and the Rudolf Steiner College in Fair Oaks California, as well as mentoring dozens of high school teachers over the decades.

John retired in 2015 and moved to Wimberley, Texas with his wife to be near family and work on his novel, based on an investigation of his creole paternal ancestors who migrated from New Orleans to Cincinnati in the 1860's, crossing the color line to pass as white. One novel became two novels, Drausin and Josephine: We Too Shall Pass, and Lucien I: I Too Shall Pass. The first was published by Atmosphere Press on December 3rd, 2024, the day before he crossed the threshold. The second will be published sometime in 2025.

In addition to his two novels, John also wrote The Spirit of The English Language (Lindisfarne Books, 2008), Laws of the Living Language (AWSNA), Proverbs of Purgatory (AWSNA), many unpublished poems, edited The Riddle of America (AWSNA 2003), and co-edited Books for the Journey (Michaelmas Press). John worked on the editorial board of Renewal: A Journal for Waldorf Education, and published articles in Independent School, Towards, and Renewal.

John spent a lifetime soaking up music, poetry, art, language, nature, the work of Rudolf Steiner, and above all, people. He glowed in grace, dignity, humor, dedication to truth and love throughout his life, and during this past year in particular. He was a loving husband, father, grandfather, son, brother, cousin, friend, student, teacher, colleague, and stranger.

John was preceded in death by his mother, Rosamond Reed Wulsin, and his father, John Hager Wulsin. He is survived by his wife Jane Wulsin, his children Lara Wulsin and Seth Wulsin, their mother Alice Barton and brother Peter Karnovski, their children Fiona Adams and Jack Adams, and Sofia Leona Wulsin Winograd and Dante Wulsin Winograd, his four siblings Lawson Wulsin, Drausin Wulsin, Rosamond Reed Wulsin II and Stockton Wulsin, Jane's children Gillian Johnson and Shannon Honigblum, and their children, Knut Johnson, Beryl Johnson, Kayden Johnson, Olivia Johnson, Zachary Honigblum, Sam Honigblum and Zoe Honigblum.

A memorial will be held in Rose Hall at Green Meadow Waldorf School in Spring Valley, New York, on January 4th, 2pm, followed by a reception at the Main House.