A Rebel...

While at MIT working on his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, Dad had a summer job that allowed him to work on his senior thesis. So while the other students were struggling with their topics, he was getting paid $1.75/hour to work on his. Apparently there were PhD students that were unable to solve the problem that his amplifier solved and they were shocked to learn his plan was successful. 

According to Tim Jackson in the book Inside Intel, Dad was a rebel: 

Political radicalism was not dead inside Intel. Its leading exponent was a gifted young circuit designer by the name of Joel Karp. With bell-bottoms and long hair, Karp was willing to risk the consternation of his employers by carrying anti-Vietnam petitions around Intel parties.

Karp displayed a wonderful ability to wind up his more conventional colleagues. On one occasion, a new sales executive bumped into him as he was about to leave the office for a technical meeting with a client. The shocked sales chief took one look at Karp's shoulder-length hair and ordered him to get it cut before attending the meeting. The following day, Karp reappeared in the office with his hair blow-dried and styled with great skill, but only one-eighth of an inch shorter than the day before. There was silence from his colleagues as Karp walked down the lab, informed the sales chief with a smile that he was going to claim the haircut as a business expense, and presented him with a receipt for the then astounding sum of $25. 

It was no surprise to me that Dad bonded easily with Jimmy over computers. They spent many hours over the years discussing techie stuff. Dad bought me my first computer in 1985, just in time for my final semester at San Diego State. It was a Compaq desktop with dual floppies and no hard drive along with a dot matrix printer. As much as technology has progressed during my lifetime, it’s crazy to realize how Dad was in the thick of things as he helped design game-changing memory chips.  

Dad was interviewed by the Computer History Museum in Silicon Valley in 2003. He arranged for a private behind-the-scenes tour of the museum for me and the girls during our visit in 2007, which Jimmy was really disappointed to have missed. I stupidly put off opening the link Dad sent me about his interview because I wrongly assumed it was an audio recording. Granted, I had to skip many pages that were far too technical for me, but I learned so much about Dad and what he worked on during his fascinating career. How sad that I missed the opportunity to discuss with him the many stories that I thoroughly enjoyed reading. And how disappointing that I failed to tell him how much I would miss him when he was gone.

 

My Talented Father...

One of my funniest memories of Dad was when he was a guest reader for Ashlynn’s Year 2 (1st grade) class in The Hague. He really hammed it up while reading The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs. He took on the persona of the wolf and by the end of the book had the kids in such a frenzy that Mrs. Cross was truly cross. Dad was pretty excited that he’d be remembered as the grandpa who nearly started a riot.

Following on his comedic reading, Dad starred along with Ann and the girls in two backyard plays. During our visit in August 2007, ten-year-old Veronica adapted Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night with each star playing at least two parts. Dad especially embraced his role of Sir Toby Belch, clearly living up to his name in this photo.

Two summers later, he was hilarious playing the mother in Travel to the Future, an original play by the girls.

Beyond his comedic abilities, Dad was a gifted jazz musician, playing the trombone and piano since childhood. After he retired, he played regularly in three local jazz bands. You might notice in this photo that he was a fair bit older than the other musicians. Age wasn’t the only thing that differentiated him from the others as they all were attending Stanford University and he never did, but they were short a trombonist so put aside any rivalry with MIT. He was thrilled to go on an European tour twice with the band, which is how I managed to take this photo of the band in Paris in June 2015. 

Veronica took these photos in August 2018 at the San Jose Jazz Festival. The girls regularly attended his concerts when they visited.

Ashlynn dedicated a show to Dad on the University of Glasgow radio station, including songs that he loved as well as songs that we remember him by (for instance, rock that he introduced to me but no longer listened to himself). Bilge, one of her flatmates, created the artwork: carps for Karp. 

 

A Great Grandpa...

Just for the record, Dad was not a great-grandfather, but rather a great grandfather. He thoroughly embraced the idea of me becoming a mother and adored both of my daughters from the first moment he held them—definitely the best gifts I ever gave him! Once the girls were old enough, Dad and Ann would host the girls by themselves in California for at least two weeks on the years that the four of us didn’t go together. These visits helped to cement their relationships with their grandparents while also contributing to their adventurous natures. They miss him greatly!

Holding Three-Week-Old Veronica in North Carolina

Teaching Veronica How to Play Piano

Grandpa and Grandma Visiting Newborn Ashlynn in May 2000

Grandpa and Grandma Visiting us in Holland in October 2006

Girls’ First Solo Trip to California in August 2008

Veronica’s First Solo Trip to California in August 2015

White Family Trip to California in March 2016

Girls’ Solo Trip to California in August 2018

 

A Fabulous Father...

Unfortunately, I can’t find my childhood photo album, so these photos of me and Dad fast forward 30 years. Not only did he gift me with my goofy sense of humor, but he broadened my horizons by introducing me to world travel. I am very proud to be his daughter.

Walking Me Down the Aisle on July 25, 1993

Christmas 1995 with Jimmy, Ann and Leigh in Seoul 

Meeting up with Eden in Houston in 1996

Visiting Us in Holland in October 2006

California in July 2011

Meeting up in Paris in June 2015

California in August 2017 with Ann

 

A Great Loss...

It is with a heavy heart that I must share the sad news that my father passed away peacefully on April 8 after a prolonged fight with prostate cancer. I regret that I listened to his medical team and didn’t hop on a plane when he was last admitted to the hospital. By the time they said I should come out, it was too late. I last saw him in October 2019. The four of us were supposed to go out last summer for his 80th birthday and his and Ann’s 40th anniversary, but COVID got in the way. 

I also regret that I failed to interview my Dad so that I could have documented his fascinating life story. Instead, I just have my own memories of the various stories he shared with me over the years, which are likely inaccurate and very incomplete. I truly struggled to write this obituary, but definitely not for a lack of content. It was difficult to condense so much history into a short description, so I concentrated on stating the facts but left out the intricacies of his life, such as being a first-generation American and the first in his family to go to college.  

Portraits of Sheep...

Among the dozens of photos I’ve taken of the sheep, there are a few that stand out: two newborn lambs standing in the food trough...

…precious mother and child moments...

…whiners (presumably begging to get milked)...

...no respect for elders...

…meeting the new kid on the block...

…and posers.

While most days the sheep completely ignored us, sometimes they approached us for some attention.

 

Springtime Lambs...

Between December 2020 and April 2021, there were three separate set of lambs born at our local farm. This pen was set up for the babies and toddlers to be able to fit through the bars to access kibble...

…which is apparently the same kibble that the mamas push and shove to gain access to through these two gated chutes where the kibble is dispensed.  

Was honestly surprised that I actually managed to capture an image of three babies nursing simultaneously. 

In early April, we were surprised to find the barn completely empty...

…but happy to find loads of babies and toddlers in the paddocks with their mamas. 

We also spotted the new black sheep in the family, which had been recently relocated from another farm. 

By mid-March, the teenagers, who had been born in December and January, were weaned from their mamas, who had been born on the farm in April 2020, and moved over to the spare barn.