James 'Jim' Swan

Jim Swan (84) died Wednesday, February 25, 2015 at Yavapai Regional Medical Center in Prescott. He was born in Wooster, Ohio on October 2, 1930 to James Leroy and Virginia Vashta Swan. His achievements in life were many. He was active in Scouting and became an Eagle Scout as well as participating in Basketball and Football in High School, College, and the Army. He graduated from the College of Wooster with a Major in Geology in 1952 and enlisted in the Army. He served as a Master Sergeant in Korea and was honorably discharged in 1954. He then attended Ohio State for one year working on the prerequisites he needed to enter the Business Administration program at Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio from which he graduated with a Masters’ Degree in Industrial Management. He met his future wife, Sandy, while on a week end trip back to Wooster where she was a student at the college, and they were married in September, 1956. He accepted a position at the Union Carbide Corp. During his years at Union Carbide he was Director of Information Systems of the Battery Products Division. He established the first Information Systems Department for this Division and implemented long range planning and design for corporate interface. Following this he spent 2 years as a Vice President of the Bowery Savings Bank in New York in charge of Data Processing. In 1981 he and his family moved to California where he worked for Certified Grocers of California and while there served on a committee which researched and selected the bar code which now appears on every product sold. After retiring in 1991 he and his wife moved to Prescott. He successfully built 3 homes in Prescott while also managing to coach little league Football (the Jaguars) for 10 years. (This is in addition to coaching his sons in the same capacity in Yorktown Heights, NY for 10 years.) Coaching these 5th and 6th graders was one of his proudest loves and achievements as well as the love he had for his wife and family. He leaves his wife, Sandy, of 58 years, and sons, Grant of Scottsdale, AZ, Stuart and his wife, Gail of Moreno Valley, CA and Russell and his wife, Susan, of Midlothian, VA in addition to his grandchildren, Brendan of Menifee, CA and granddaughter, Krystle of Moreno Valley, CA; and grandson, Kyle of Washington, DC and granddaughter, Ashley, of Midlothian, VA.