James Alexander Grant

James Alexander Grant died on October 3, 2024 - coincidentally also his birthday - at the age of 89. He was surrounded by his family, who had just sung happy birthday to him.



James "Jim" Grant was born in Inverness, Scotland, in 1935, the son of Aileen and Ian Grant. He grew up in the Highlands, spending his summers herding sheep in the hills around Loch Ness and fly fishing with his dad. After graduating from the University of Aberdeen with a B.S. in geology, he left Scotland for Canada where he earned his M.S. at Queens University, then on to Pasadena, CA, for his Ph.D. at Caltech. While there, he met his future wife, Christabel Smyth (from Dublin, Ireland), married, and soon moved to Minneapolis for his first job as a geology professor at the U of MN. Parenthood arrived in the late 1960s with the births of their children Fiona and Ian. In 1969, the family moved to Duluth when Jim joined the UMD geology department, where he would work for the next 35 years. In 1991, they welcomed Serguei Pakhomov, a student from Petrozavodsk, Russia, to live with them. Serguei quickly became their "Russian son" and has been a part of the Grant family ever since. In 1989, they bought land on Lake Nebagamon, WI, building their dream home there, which continues to be the hub of family life to this day.



Passionate about teaching and research, he was a co-founder of the still-running geology field camp in Park City, Utah, working there during the summers for a decade, spent summers in the 1980s mapping in Wyoming, and was a founding director of the study abroad program for UMD in Birmingham, England. Active in the community, he sang in the bass section of St. Paul's Episcopal Church choir from 1970 onward, sang in the Duluth Superior Symphony Chorus, was a board member of the Duluth Superior Symphony, founding chair of the Scottish Heritage Assoc. of Duluth, member of the Duluth Rotary Club for over two decades, and volunteer at the Bong WWII Heritage Center in Superior, WI.



Jim loved to travel, cook (and eat!), play games, and continued downhill skiing into his late 70s. He was famous (or infamous) for his puns and stories, often starting a pun at the beginning of dinner and working his way through the meal to reveal the pun at the end. He was funny, welcoming, sweet-natured, and had a contagious laugh and always a glimmer in his eyes.



Family was everything to him. For Jim the sun rose and set on Christabel. He supported with gusto anything his children, their spouses, and grandchildren were into and was so proud of them all. He loved traveling with the family to far flung places around the world, but his most cherished moments were spent surrounded by family and friends at their home on Lake Nebagamon.



He is survived by his wife Christabel Grant of 60 years, daughter Fiona Pradhan (Ravi Pradhan), son Ian Grant (Lisa Grant), Russian son Serguei Pakhomov (Amy Pakhomov), and grandchildren Tara Pradhan, Alex Grant, and Owen Pakhomov.



A Celebration of Life service will be held at 11:00 AM on Friday, October 11th, at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, 1710 E. Superior St., Duluth, MN 55812. Visitation will begin at 10:00 AM, and a lunch reception will follow the service. Memorial donations may be made to St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Duluth (stpaulsduluth.org), or the Duluth Superior Symphony Orchestra (dsso.com).