John S. Bradshaw

John Stratlii (Jack) Bradshaw, 82, died March 26, 2010, quietly at home in Oceanside, surrounded by Dolores, his wife of 39 years, and his three adult children: Ylisabyth (Libby), Vaughn, and Victoria.  The cause of death was metastasized Melanoma.

 

John S. Bradshaw was born on October 15, 1927 in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, England to Elizabeth Yates Bradshaw and John Horsley Bradshaw.  He was their only child.  His father died before John S. Bradshaw was born.  When her son was two years old, Elizabeth brought him back to California to become the third generation of San Diegans in her family. Elizabeth's parents had immigrated from England in 1884, with their eight children to a ranch in rural Dehesa, where Elizabeth was born in 1885.

 

John S. Bradshaw graduated from Hoover High School and San Diego State College before enrolling in a graduate program at Scripps Institute of Oceanography in 1950.  In 1957 he was awarded the Ph.D. degree in Marine Micropalentology from UCLA of which Scripps was an affiliate.

 

RESEARCH AT SCRIPPS

Working under the supervision of Professors Martin Johnson, a biologist, and Fred Phleger, a geologist, Dr. Bradshaw began to study living forms of a plankton that had previously been valued by paleontologists as a sedimentary species only for its fossil remains in such landforms as the Cliffs of Dover, England, where the calcareous remains of fossil foraminifera give the cliffs their white color. Living foraminifera became the center of Dr. Bradshaw’s research, as he worked to discover all aspects of the ecology of foraminifera.  Working in the laboratory, he developed a system for successfully culturing forams, and  in 1953 he joined the six-month long Transpac Expedition with other scientists from Scripps Institute across the Pacific, first traveling north to the Bering Straits and then to Japan before heading back across the Pacific to San Diego.  At regular intervals Dr. Bradshaw gathered samples of the ocean to observe the numbers, sizes and types of foraminifera at different locations, temperatures, and depths which, back in the laboratory, he then plotted on large graphs to demonstrate the ubiquitous distribution and varied conditions under which the living forms of the plankton thrived.

 

In addition to studies of Pacific Ocean forms of foraminifera, Dr. Bradshaw took advantage of Scripps Institute’s relationship with the lagoons in Baja, CA, where he traveled with other Scripps scientists to examine the habitat of living, functioning lagoons.

 

UNIVERSITY OF SAN DIEGO AND LAGOON WORK

In the mid-1960s, Dr. Bradshaw left Scripps and joined the faculty of the University of San Diego.  Working with students in marine studies there, he undertook studies of San Diego’s coastal lagoons as well as Mission Bay.  He became a noted authority on local lagoons and was called to give expert testimony to justify the environmental significance of preserving and rehabilitating lagoons and open spaces where local flora and fauna could continue to flourish for the benefit of all.  He is known for having helped preserve the San Elijo, Penesquitos, and San Dieguito lagoons as well as the Torrey Pines Extension preserve, Crest Canyon, and Tecolote Canyon.

 

Following retirement from USD in the 1990s, Dr. Bradshaw gave his full attention to the avocado ranch in San Marcos where he resided until 2006 when he moved to a retirement community in Oceanside to complete his life’s journey.

 

FAMILY

Survived by his wife, Dolores Bradshaw; two daughters, Dr. Libby Bradshaw of Lincoln, MA and her husband Peter Conrad; Victoria Bradshaw, Ph.D. of Del Mar; and one son, Vaughn Bradshaw of Port Ludlow, WA; four stepsons, Joe Todd of Hawaii, Dan Todd of Oceanside, CA; Brian Todd of Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Martin Todd of Vista, CA, and his first wife, Sarah Dubin-Vaughn of Del Mar.  He was predeceased by his older son John Yates Bradshaw, a geologist. A grandson and grand daughter as well as several step-grandchildren also survive him.

 

Resided in San Diego from 1929 to 1952; Del Mar from 1952 to 1980; San Marcos 1980 to 2006; Oceanside 2006 to end of life. 

 

 

Born: Oct 15, 1927 in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, England

Died: Mar 26, 2010 in Oceanside, CA

About: Scripps Institute of Oceanography San Diego Native Plant Society Torrey Pines Society

Obituary

FROM THE SIO (SCRIPPS INSTITUTE OF OCEANOGRAPHY) LOG

JOHN S. BRADSHAW ­ John S. Bradshaw died March 26, 2010 after a long battle with the oceanographer’s disease, skin cancer. Jack was one of the group of five Martin Johnson students here at Scripps who, in the late 1950s, established the field of pelagic, ecological, biogeography. They found that large-scale, ocean-wide species patterns of major taxa showed coherent spatial patterns, that is, many different species occurred together more often than by chance. The spatial patterns of these recurrent groups coincided very nicely with Sverdrup’s Water Mass patterns. This strongly implies that these ancient physical structures are the major habitats for pelagic, community-ecosystems, where species have co-evolved and are tied to those physical-climatic domains. Jack’s special contribution to this program came through his study of the Pacific-wide distributions of pelagic foraminifera. Of all the groups studied this one was of great importance because of their extensive fossil remains in the sediment, from which change of pattern over time may be inferred. Jack’s work on these “community indicators” was, and still is, essential to our insight into the history of oceanic ecosystem patterns and the role of ancient climates in regulating species diversity/abundance and the patterns of physical structure, now called “Paleo-oceanography.” After retirement Jack became a “Gentleman Avocado Farmer.” (John McGowan, jmcgowan@ucsd.edu)

  John Stratlii Bradshaw October 15, 1927 – March 26, 2010

 

  

John Stratlii Bradshaw (Jack) passed away peacefully surrounded by family. He will be deeply missed by all who loved him.

 

Jack received his undergraduate degree in chemistry from San Diego State University, was graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles, and performed postdoctoral work at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography.  He taught Marine Biology and Ecology at the University of San Diego.

 

He is survived by his wife Dee Bradshaw; children Libby Bradshaw, Vaughn Bradshaw, Victoria Bradshaw, Joe Todd, Dan Todd, Brian Todd, and Marty Todd; and seven grandchildren, and was predeceased by his son John Y. Bradshaw.