H.
Taylor Buckner passed away quietly at home with the use of MAID, at
age 86.
He
was born in Louisville, Ky., the elder of two sons, to Hubbard George
Buckner and Kate Tebbs (Helm) Buckner. His early years were spent in
schools in Louisville.
After
a very formative junior year at the University of Edinburgh in
Scotland, Taylor graduated with a BS from University of Louisville in
1959. During a brief time at Indiana University, he met and married
Judith Friedl and had a son, James Taylor Buckner. They lived in San
Francisco and Oakland, Calif., where Taylor earned his MA in 1964 and
PhD in sociology in 1967, both from the University of California,
Berkeley. While there, he wrote articles on police culture, rumor
transmission and the transvestic career path and studied a
flying-saucer cult, some of whose members thought he was a Martian.
(He was six-five, and “everyone knows Martians are tall.”) Later
he authored a book titled Deviance, Reality and Change. For
more details, see tbuckner.com.
After
teaching at San Francisco State College for a year, they moved to
Montréal, where Taylor spent the next 30 years as a professor at
Concordia University.
Several
sabbatical leaves afforded him the chance to travel the world in 1973
and 1974, where he read the six o’clock news on ACTV in Osaka,
Japan; improved his Spanish in Argentina; and then begin his MBA
during 1979 and 1980. He graduated with an MBA from Hautes Études
Commerciales, the business school of the Université de Montréal, in
1984.
While
living in Montréal, Taylor founded a neighborhood organization —
Shaughnessy Village Association — which greatly enhanced the
ambience of a small, residential, downtown area of the city. The
association, still very active today, was instrumental in preserving
the historic Victorian and Edwardian architecture of the old homes in
the area and preventing their replacement with high-rise buildings.
Taylor’s
first marriage ended in divorce in 1969. In 1972 he met Jennifer
Grove, and they were married in 1975.
He
retired in 1996, and in 1998 he and Jennifer moved to South Hero,
Vt., where Taylor began a retail shotgun business, Hero’s Arms.
He
was predeceased by his parents and is survived by his wife of 48
years, Jennifer Grove Buckner, of South Hero; his son, James Taylor
Buckner, of Sherman Oaks, Calif.; and his brother, John A. Buckner,
of Louisville, Ky.
At
Taylor’s request, there will be no visitation, funeral or memorial.
Donations in his memory may be made to South Hero Volunteer Fire and Rescue Departments, 131 Community Ln., South Hero, VT 05486, and the
McClure Miller Respite House, 3113 Roosevelt Hwy., Colchester, VT
05446.
This article appears in Jun 19-25, 2024.