Joseph K. Faulkner

1931 - 2020

Joseph “Kaye” Taylor Faulkner passed away on March 13, 2020, at the age of 88, in Bellingham, Washington, while in Hospice care. Kaye dedicated his life to the study and teaching of economics, union organizing and story writing. He shared these passions in his most recent endeavor, organizing and leading several writers’ groups at the Bellingham Senior Center and the former Leopold Apartments. Kaye was born in a railroad shack in Thompson, Utah, on December 31, 1931, to Knox Edgar Faulkner and Fern Effie Taylor. His father was a monument letter cutter and sometime coal truck driver. His mother was an artist and homemaker. Kaye spent much of his early childhood accompanying his father across the United States, carving headstones and frequently sleeping in their truck. In 1952 he married Ruth Wilson with whom he had two sons, Joel and Mark. They were later divorced. He later married Constance Parry and had two children: Kathryn and Kevin. They divorced in 1976. Kaye served in the Utah Air National Guard during the Korean War as an electrician and radar technician. With the G. I. Bill for support, he entered the University of Utah from which he received his B.S. in 1957 and his Ph.D. in 1965, both in economics. His dissertation subject was “Technocracy.” In 1962 he took his first academic job at Western Washington State College where he taught for many years and was instrumental in beginning the process for establishing collective bargaining for university professors at Western Washington University. He also taught one summer (1965) at Northern Iowa University in Cedar Falls, Iowa, and in 1966-67 took a leave from WWU to teach at the American University in Cairo, in Cairo, Egypt. Kaye left Western to take a position with the national American Federation of Teachers which took him across the state of Washington and eventually the United States. He continued this work of bringing organized labor and collective bargaining to many community colleges and universities during his career. He left the AFT in 1990 and took a three-year position as lecturer in economics at Massey University in Palmerston, North New Zealand, before returning to Bellingham to retire in 1993. Kaye married Mollie Bartholick in 1981 and the two of them spent much time traveling the world by foot, car, train and boat. Both Kaye and Mollie enjoyed their many dogs, Trevor, Max, Boule and Mariah. Preceding Kaye in death were his two sisters, Mary Ellen and Shirley and his brother Stephan. He is survived by his wife, Mollie Faulkner, of Bellingham, daughter Kathryn Jean Faulkner and her two daughters of Bellingham, and three sons: Joel Kaye Faulkner (Gloria) and his two children and two grandchildren, Mark Elliott Faulkner (Mary) and 3 step-children of Freedom, WY, and Lawrence Kevin Faulkner and his wife Terri, of Blaine, WA. At his request there will be no memorial service, but the family asks, in his memory, to always tip your waiter or waitress, at least 25%.