James Pearce Fornango

Fornango, James Pearce passed away on October 19th, 2018 in his home. He was born February 15th, 1943 in Joliet, Illinois and grew up there. He graduated from the University of Illinois in 1965 with a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and went on to do graduate work on the ground breaking ILLIAC Computers and early computer pattern recognition software. He became a research engineer for the Army Corps of Engineers before relocating to St. Louis to join the Monsanto research team in 1984. He retired from Monsanto in 1996 but continued to consult on experiment instrumentation issues. Jim enjoyed a lifelong love of music. He sang in church and school choirs and barbershop quartets, and he played the alto saxophone, including in the University of Illinois Jazz Band. One of his greatest joys was attending concerts around town from the Symphony to high school band shows and anything in between. He was founding member of the Parkway North Band Backers parents association, supporting all three of his children through the marching band program. Jim also had a passion for photography, and his skills were in high demand, whether he was documenting experiment results, concerts, celestial events, or family moments. Jim was preceded in death by his parents and his brother, Mark Fornango. He is survived by his three children, Jim Fornango (Donna) of Maryland Heights, MO., Robert Fornango (Aimee Dobson) of Phoenix, AZ, and Elizabeth Fornango of Los Angeles, CA; their mother Jean Sims Fornango of St. Louis, MO; and his partner Linda Larson of St. Louis, MO, as well as his two grandchildren and his brother Douglas Fornango of Chicago, IL. Services: Funeral services will be held at St. Monica Catholic Church in St. Louis at 11 a.m. on Friday, October 26th, 2018, with visitation one hour prior. In lieu of flowers, donations in his name to the SSM Health Cardinal Glennon Children's Foundation in his name would be appreciated. Ortmann Stipanovich Funeral Home osfuneralhomes.com