Jack Maurice Warnick

1932 - 2023

Jack Maurice Warnick

June 11, 1932 - November 21, 2023

Tacoma, Washington - Jack Warnick, a longtime advocate for civil rights and human rights as a Tacoma civic and political leader for nearly seven decades, including 14 years on the Tacoma City Council and two terms as deputy mayor, died on Tuesday. He was 91.

Other than college, Jack spent his entire life in Tacoma and dedicated himself to improving the city and the lives of its residents. He served as president or chair of a wide range of community organizations advocating for civil rights, youth, and arts. In the early 1960's, married with four young children, Jack volunteered for Tacoma's Urban Renewal Program and soon co-authored Tacoma's Open Housing Ordinance, which made housing discrimination illegal in the city. Two decades later, as a member of the City Council, he successfully introduced Tacoma's first ordinance providing legal protection for members of the LGBTQ community under the city's anti-discrimination law. In 2018, Jack was one of 21 citizens recognized by the Tacoma Historical Society as the city's Social Justice and Civil Rights Champions. In honoring him, the Historical Society noted his "commitment to justice and action for a better Tacoma."

Jack Maurice Warnick was born in Tacoma on June 11, 1932, the son of Robert and Phreda Warnick. He was one of 16 members of his family across three generations to graduate from Stadium High School, including his father, his three siblings, and his four children. While at Stadium, Jack was senior class vice-president and sports editor of the yearbook, and played varsity football for two years. In 2021, he was inducted into the school's Hall of Fame. Jack attended Reed College for one year before transferring to the University of Washington, where he earned a bachlelor's degree in philosophy and served as president of his fraternity, Zeta Beta Tau.

Two months after graduating from college, Jack married Lilly Thal. She died in 2018 after 65 years of marriage. Jack was extraordinarily well-rounded, widely respected, humble, genuinely curious about others, and devoted to his family. He enjoyed music, sports, reading, traveling, cribbage, bridge, ice cream, and peanut butter. He played piano his entire life and loved show tunes and especially pre-WWII American standards. He and his wife shared a love of music (she played violin) and attended performances regularly, and shortly after her death he underwrote a classical music concert in Tacoma in her memory, featuring six members of the Seattle Symphony. As a widower, he maintained his love for concerts, theater, movies, travel and learning. He shared Friday night Sabbath dinners regularly with a group of friends. In the past year, he attended senior programs in Southern California for a film festival and on an island near Georgia for bridge. Less than two months ago, he flew 6,000 miles to take two consecutive cruises, by himself, in the Greek Islands, and then flew to Israel to visit family members for two weeks. Until his death, he hosted a weekly cribbage game at his house with close friends. He was never without peanut butter in his house, and he kept only Adams, which was founded in Tacoma 16 years before he was born.

In his professional life, Jack was the president of Puget Sound Manufacturing Inc., a family wood products business founded in 1919 by his grandfather, an immigrant from a shtetl near Kiev in the Ukraine. He started working there full-time immediately after graduating from college, and in 1965 he and his beloved older brother Alan, with whom he graduated from both high school and college, jointly assumed ownership. After 53 years, Jack retired in 2006.

Jack's list of community activities covered a wide range of efforts to make others' lives better. He served as president or chair of the Tacoma Housing Authority, the Tacoma Human Relations Commission, the Tacoma Sister-City Council, the D.A. Gonyea branch of the Boys & Girls Club, the Young Men's Business Club, Tacoma's Urban Renewal Committee on Housing and Social Welfare, Temple Beth El, and the Tacoma chapter of B'nai B'rith. In addition, he participated as an active board member of Pierce Transit, the Private Industry Council, the Broadway Center for the Performing Arts, the Tacoma-Pierce County Arts Commission, the Tacoma-Pierce County Boys & Girls Clubs, the Mount Rainier Council of the Boy Scouts of America, the Northwest Region of the Anti-Defamation League, the Tacoma Area Coalition of Individuals with Disabilities, the Northwest Region of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and the Northwest Region of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations. He was a member of the Rotary Club of Tacoma for more than five decades. Jack and his wife co-founded Tacoma's sister-city relationship with Kiryat Motzkin, Israel.

His community honors included the Outstanding Citizen Award of the National Conference of Christians and Jews. Upon his retirement from public office, Tacoma officials awarded him the Key to the City. Not surprisingly, given the number of years of living in the same city, Jack's vast network of friends, colleagues and associates included former classmates and people met through community activities, politics, synagogue, his children's sports teams, and the YMCA, where he played racquetball several mornings a week for decades. Despite outliving nearly all of his peers, for his 90th birthday party last year, he struggled to limit his guest list to 230 people.

Jack is survived by his three sons, Todd (Minette), Mark, and Craig (Janet) Warnick; his daughter, Lisa Fein (Warren); his brother, Fred Warnick; his sisters-in-law, Saralee Warnick and Sulja Warnick; and seven grandchildren, Michal (Amir Weiss), Alon (Orit), Gil, Ben (Adi Ezra), and Elliana Warnick, and Samuel and Jacob Fein. He was predeceased by his wife, Lilly; his parents, Robert and Phreda Warnick; his brother, Alan Warnick; his sister, Elsa Warnick Erceg; and his brothers-in-law, Dr. Nathan Thal, Dr. Sam Thal, Sid Thal, and Dr. Ben Thal.

A funeral service will be held at 10:30 am on Sunday, Nov. 26, at Temple Beth El, 5975 S. 12th St., Tacoma, followed by burial at Home of Peace Cemetery, 5421 Steilacoom Blvd. S.W., Lakewood. Donations in his memory may be made to the Temple Beth El Rabbi Richard Rosenthal Continuing Jewish Education Fund or StandWithUs.