J ames Arthur Malcolm Jr., 93, of Shelburne, Vt., died on Sept. 29, 2010, in Shelburne.
He was born in Jericho in 1917, the only child of James Arthur Malcolm and Hannah Underhill Malcolm.
Jim grew up in Jericho on the family farm and attended Jericho Public School and graduated from Friends Academy in nearby Locust Valley in 1934. He continued his education at Swarthmore College, receiving a degree in electrical engineering in 1938, and completed a master’s degree in industrial engineering from Columbia University in 1940. He worked for the Radio Corp. of America, RCA, in Camden, N.J., before and after World War II in the early years of television production. During WWII he did critical defense work at RCA. He joined Work Factor Co. in 1950 where they developed innovative factory time and motion techniques that were used by many of the world’s largest corporations. He was then appointed vice president of research for Science Management Corp.
He married Janet Dorothy Wilson of Jenkintown, Pa., in November 1942 and they lived in Rydal and Abington, Pa., and in 1951 moved with their three children to the Malcolm Farm in Jericho. In later years they spent much of their time at their farm in Pawlet, Vt., and then retired to Wake Robin in Shelburne, Vt. Jim also enjoyed their family summer home in Bayville and their house in Vero Beach, Fla.
Jim served on local school boards in Jericho and was chairman of the Board of Trustees of Friends Academy. He was also very active in the Jericho Friends Meeting.
Jim loved the farm in Jericho. It was always populated with a jersey cow, sheep, ducks and chickens. He continued this love of the land and farming in Pawlet with a small herd of Herefords. His love of farming was inherently passed on to his children.
Jim was known for his enthusiastic curious nature, his love of learning, and his ability to engage and entertain others with his (true) story telling. He loved everything mechanical starting in his early childhood days of building radios and working on Ford Model T cars. He skied in the Poconos, the Alps, and Vermont. His eclectic tastes ran from loving cats and farming to opera. He had a love of travel and was interested in experiencing all modes of transportation. On one occasion he took a Greyhound bus across the country so he could take advantage of a deal to go back across the country on the same bus for $1. Another time, he showed up at a dinner party on his tractor. He was rarely seen without a cap and was especially fond of his “Pawlet Vermont” hat and he loved only “broken-in” clothes. He had a unique ways of finding home remedies to cure his ailments that would impress, perplex, and amuse his family.
He was a creative man who could find a solution for fixing anything to keep it going and he took pleasure in saving everything, just in case he needed it later. He had a thousand different uses for a roll of paper towels. He also had the uncanny ability to find four leaf clovers in any patch of grass. He always found the good in people and was genuinely interested in others’ accomplishments and interests. His greatest pleasure and pride was to share these wonderful traits with the most important people to him, his wife of 66 years, Jaydee, who predeceased him in September 2009, and children, grandchildren, and great- grandchildren.
He is survived by three children, James A. Malcolm III (Chip) and his wife, Nancy, of Middlebury, Vt., Elizabeth (Betsy) Eklof of Colchester, Vt., and John Malcolm and Sue LaPorte of Pawlet, Vt.; six grandchildren, Sarah LaPerle and her husband, Adam, Sven Eklof and his wife, Irma, James (Jed) Malcolm and his wife, Janet, , Robert Eklof, Kari Antonucci and her husband, John, (Nooch), and Abbe Malcolm and her companion, John Bergman; and six great-grandchildren.
Miller & Ketcham of Brandon is assisting the family in funeral arrangements. There will be a memorial remembrance in Shelburne at a later date.
