MEET JOHN.
John has lived his entire life in East Central Indiana, all but 4 years in Blackford, Delaware, and Randolph Counties. John lives on the 40 acre farm near Hartford City his grandparents purchased 70 years ago. Three of his four grandparents descended from the pioneers who settled eastern Delaware County and all of Randolph County in the 1830s and 1840s. He was excited when the new district lines were announced because his roots run deep and he has a deep-seated desire to serve the friends and family in District 33.
John grew up on the Randolph County side of Albany with a Ridgeville address, Redkey phone, and graduated in 1989 from Monroe Central High School. He attended Indiana University in Bloomington graduating in 1993 with a double major in political science and history. He attended a year of law school and has worked on a master’s degree in history. He has worked in IT support in Indianapolis for more than 25 years at a major security company. John has lived and worked on his family’s farm most of his life. He often says that he can do most anything from basic carpentry, plumbing, electrical, auto mechanics, and tending to crops and livestock because of growing up on a farm, and he often does. He understands many of the issues which working people face every day because he has lived them himself. He is a learner and an achiever. He has a great ability to see the entire picture and how things are connected, and then see how to create an innovative solution. This has served well in his IT support career and is something he wants to bring to the issues facing the people of District 33 and Hoosiers in general.
John has been very active in the community. He has served as the Chair of the Blackford County Democratic Party since 2018. He has also been a Cubmaster for a local Cub Scout pack. He has volunteered for Habitat for Humanity, Build a Better Blackford (blight elimination), Second Harvest Food Bank, and the Appalachian Service Project, donating a week of his vacation each year to improve homes in Appalachian states. He also has volunteered for the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life. He is a member of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Muncie and served as vice president on its Board of Trustees for four years.
John has been blessed with a beautiful wife, Maggie, and four children (Jeff & wife Jamie, Ben, Madison, and Sarah), all of whom are grown. Three of them have or are working on degrees from Ball State. The family also has two basset hounds, Libby and Watson, who are our sad-eyed babies. John enjoys spending free time playing games and watching movies with his family, going to the ballpark to watch a baseball game, and driving his 1951 Studebaker for ice cream on Sunday afternoons.