John James Cogan

John James Cogan, beloved husband and father, passed away August 15, 2022 at seventy-six, in Oakland, California.

John was born in Dedham, Massachusetts, where his parents ran the Apple Tree Diner, a popular train car diner that saw customers from the Red Sox to-it was rumored-the Boston Strangler. The diner has been featured in many books including Classic Diners of Massachusetts.

John went to college and graduate school at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he completed a PhD in Renaissance literature. During that time, he married Diane Scott and welcomed twin daughters, Jessica and Justine. The family relocated to suburban Chicago. John ran marathons and cross-country skied while working at Precision Twist Drill and earning his Masters in Human Resources at Loyola University of Chicago. Finally the cold got to the family and they moved to Southern California where John continued his career in Human Resources, rising to Director of Human Resources and Benefits at Southern California Edison.

In 2001, John married Mary-Ann Spencer and settled in Pasadena. Together, John and Mary-Ann began sailing, something that would become a life-long passion for the couple. They kept their boat for many years in Ventura, spending weekends making trips to Catalina and the Channel Islands while finding a community of friends and fellow sailors. They crewed aboard a boat to Bermuda across the Gulf Stream and then after John retired from Edison, another on an Atlantic crossing from the Canary Islands to Antigua, before selling their Pasadena house and moving aboard their last sailboat, SV Old Moon and untying from the dock. After spending a year sailing the Pacific coast of Mexico, they returned stateside and settled in the San Francisco Bay Area. After selling SV Old Moon, they continued their ocean travels aboard nature cruises to the Galapagos, Baja California, San Juan Islands, Alaska, British Columbia and the Columbia River. But when they were home on dry land, they spent time with family, especially Mary-Ann's daughters and their families.

John is survived, and is greatly missed by his wife, Mary-Ann, daughters Justine and Jessica, granddaughter Maisie, sons-in-law Nathan and Chad, stepdaughters Jennifer and Katie, their husbands Rob and Ryan, and granddaughters Caroline and Maggie and grandsons Sam and Ollie.