Kenneth Weaver

Memorial services for Kenneth Franklin Weaver, 94, Lawrence, will be at Lawrence Presbyterian Manor Chapel at 4 PM, Sunday, October 3, 2010. Mr. Weaver died Monday, September 20, 2010, at Lawrence Presbyterian Manor.

He was born on November 29, 1915, near Grand Junction, Colorado, the son of Earnest Frank and Ruby Glandon Weaver.

He graduated from Clovis High School in Clovis, New Mexico, and from McPherson College in McPherson, KS, in 1937.

Mr. Weaver taught high school in Meriden, KS, and at Liberty Memorial High School in Lawrence from 1937-1941. He moved to Washington, DC, in 1941, then to Arlington, Virginia in 1944. He worked as a writer for several organizations, then joined the staff of the National Geographic Magazine in 1952. He rose to Senior Assistant Editor of the magazine and served as Science Editor for twenty years before retiring in 1985. He wrote many widely-acclaimed articles about science and the American space program, including the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs, for which he won more than a dozen national awards. He was a life member of the Science Writers’ Association and served as president of the Aviation/Space Writers’ Association. His work took him to every continent in the world, including a visit to the South Pole.
In Arlington, Mr. Weaver was active in nonpartisan county politics and was a member of the Cosmos Club, the Washington Wine and Food Society, and the Presbyterian Church of the Covenant in Arlington. In 2000, Mr. and Mrs. Weaver returned to Lawrence, and have lived at Lawrence Presbyterian Manor since 2003.

He married Modena Kauffman on June, 4, 1939, in Topeka, Kansas. She survives of the home.

Other survivors include a son, Robert Weaver and wife Betsy, of Lawrence; a daughter, Kathryn Wynn and husband  Richard, of Haverford, PA; a sister, Evelyn Griffith, of McPherson, KS; four grandchildren, Ginny Weaver and Stephanie Weaver Kemper (Chad) of Lawrence, David  Wynn (Jeannie) of Media, PA, and Mary Beth Wynn (Bret Jackson) of Riverside, IL; and six great-grandchildren, Camilla  and Nora  Lynch of Lawrence, Alexander and Mia Wynn of Media, PA, and Reese and Ryan Wynn Jackson of  Riverside.

The family suggests memorials to the Good Samaritan Fund at Lawrence Presbyterian Manor or Grace Hospice (formerly Heart of America Hospice) of Lawrence.