Lasting Memories

John Webster Working
July 9, 1925-Jan. 19, 2025
Palo Alto, California
Submitted by Craig Working

John Webster Working was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Shortly thereafter, the family moved to Palo Alto and then onto the Stanford campus where his father, Holbrook Working, would enjoy a 50 year career as a professor of economics and statistics. His mother, Helen, oversaw the home and three youngsters, John, Barbara, and Betty. John enjoyed all the peninsula had to offer: hiking the hills, searching for frogs and tadpoles in Stanford’s Lake Lagunita, swimming, biking, playing the clarinet, singing in the school and church choirs, and playing tennis and basketball. He attended the local schools, Campus Grammar, Jordon Junior High, and Palo Alto High School, where he played basketball, earning the nickname of stretch -- 6’4” gets you that -- and running track, setting a relay team record at the California State Championships.

When duty called, John enlisted in the Navy in the summer of 1943 as part of the V-12 Officer Training Program at the University of Washington. He served on the USS Bunker Hill, an aircraft carrier, in the Pacific Theater, through 1946. Once out of the Navy, he returned to school at Stanford, joining the Sigma Chi fraternity, and enjoyed being a part of Stanford academic and campus life. He met his wife to be, Beverly Andreuccetti, and they married in 1948. They had two children, Craig in 1952 and Patty in 1955. His work career began with Pacific Bell in 1949. Soon he found his calling, employee benefits, working for John Hancock, Kaiser Industries, Crocker Bank, Lawrence Labs, and back to Stanford, where he retired in 1988.

John had a deep love for community. He liked doing things, all sorts of things. With his children old enough to backpack, he became a leader with the Sierra Club, taking his and other young families into the Sierras on backpacking journeys called Threshold Trip. Beverly was a Den Mother for Cub Scouts and John supported Boy Scout Troop 57, where he and Craig regularly undertook the troop’s summer backpacking trip, the much loved 50 miler. With Patty, he rafted the Snake and Salmon rivers. John was a director on the board of The Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital, 8/1972 - 9/1991, a docent for 20 years at Stanford’s Jasper Preserve, a member of the Foothill Tennis and Swim Club where he got to enjoy three loves, tennis, swimming and domino tournaments. He was a member of the Stanford Golf Course, and had a good game. As a young adult, John worked with family and friends to build the much enjoyed family cabin, completed in 1952, at Fallen Leaf Lake, adjacent to South Tahoe, a lake the family has enjoyed summers at since the ‘30s.

In late 2001, Beverly passed away. John married Lysbeth Warren Anderson in October, 2002. They split their time between the Vi in Palo Alto and the Anderson home in Montana. They enjoyed extensive traveling. Seven passports are filled with the world’s destinations: Alaska, Iran, New Zealand, Antarctica, China, and Europe to name a few of their adventures. When not traveling, they took in local culture, the San Francisco Symphony and Opera, TheatreWorks, and plays. Osteria, The British Bankers Club, or Left Bank were favorite places for a meal out. John passed away peacefully on January 19th in his second home, Montana, with his family at his bedside. John’s was a life well lived, 99½ years of doing.