As a child growing up in Chicago, Duane Jackson spent hours in his backyard watching ants. When he served in Vietnam with the U.S. Army, he carried a butterfly net along with his M16 rifle. Given his obsession with tiny animals, it makes sense that he would craft a career as an animal behaviorist, sharing his passion for insects with Morehouse College students.
“He was revered and respected,” says chemistry professor Juana Mendenhall, vice provost at Morehouse. She collaborated with Jackson on research and considers him a mentor. “He was able to relate to anyone, in any generation. He leaves some big shoes to fill.”
Dr. Duane Myron Jackson died April 30 from cancer. He was 77. The oldest child of the Rev. Abraham Patterson Jackson — of historic Liberty Baptist Church in Chicago — and Harriet Coskrey Jackson, he earned an undergraduate degree at Morehouse and a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois.
In 1982, he joined the faculty of Clark College, now Clark Atlanta University, and later moved to Morehouse, where he taught statistics, learning and memory and animal behavior, said his widow, Dr. Fleda Mask Jackson. She is a nationally recognized expert on maternal mental health, stress and depression.
“He was considered the tough teacher,” she says. “Students would say they didn’t get the best grade, but they enjoyed the class.”
Screenwriter Julian James-Burke, a former student, says Duane Jackson was “a very vibrant character, the spirit he carried, it permeated to how he communicated with his students. He connected with every person in the room.”
Among other topics, Jackson researched aggression in insects. He loved sharing his passion and educating others about science, especially children. His lab was like a “bug museum,” colleagues say, and he published widely about the behaviors of termites and crickets. He was also the curator of invertebrates at Zoo Atlanta and served on the board of directors for decades.
“Dr. Jackson truly understood and supported one of the zoo’s greatest areas of influence, which is education,” said Raymond King, CEO and president of Zoo Atlanta. “He will be remembered and honored as a longtime supporter of the zoo, influential educator, and powerful mentor for many future scientists.”
Both Duane and Fleda Jackson supported the West Atlanta Watershed Alliance, which operates the Atlanta Outdoor Activities Center. They advocated for environmental education and justice, and he conducted workshops for young people on insects and the environment. At nature-based camp programs, Jackson would introduce children to the outdoors and insects.
“He would wow them with their characteristics and behaviors,” said environmental scientist Na’Taki Osborne Jelks, who teaches at Spelman College. Jackson developed an inventory of everything in the forest of the outdoor center and had a field site for his study of termites.
Jelks said Jackson served 10 years on the center’s board of directors, “and brought best practices to us. He’d tell me what I was doing well and what I could do better. He’s really irreplaceable.”
In addition to his wife, Duane Jackson is survived by his sisters Jasmine and Gloria Jackson; his children Kimya Imani Jackson (Pablo Virgo) and Kari Abraham Jackson; as well as numerous nieces and nephews.
A gathering is scheduled for today at 4 p.m. at the Martin Luther King Chapel on the Morehouse campus. His funeral is scheduled for Friday at 11 a.m. at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. The Rev. Raphael Warnock, who is a U.S. senator and Jackson’s former student, will deliver the eulogy.
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