Northborough, MA – John Paul Karpuk, age 92, died at home on Saturday, June 2, 2018, surrounded by his family. He was born in Worcester, MA to Catherine Gladys and Michael Karpuk, and raised at 113 Ingleside Avenue in Worcester with his sister, Jean Karpuk Glowik, who predeceased him in February 2018. John credits his Eighth Grade math teacher, Sarah Dieter, with getting him on track to consider going to college. He was attending Grafton Street Middle School, (now East Middle School), and decided to go to Classical High School in preparation for college.

At Classical High he ran track, and wore #14 at Quarterback. Sports remained an important part of his entire life. He played semi-pro football for the Worcester Zips. He was a founding member of "Northcourt," a tennis and pool club built by twenty families in Northborough in the 1960s that is still active today. He became a lifeguard in 1939, took up skiing in 1966 at 40 years old and was still doing somersaults off a diving board into his 70s. He coached Northborough Youth Baseball, and played golf and tennis every day he could and the weather was good. He was known for collecting golf balls around Juniper Hill Golf Course, and writing "Golf Sucks" on each one; he shared them with his golf buddies, as this was their constant echo back and forth after many a bad swing.

As soon as he graduated from high school in June 1944, John enlisted in the United States Navy. He attained the rank of Motor Machinist's Mate Second Class, and was in charge of the starboard Diesel Engine on the PC-1122 submarine chaser in the South Pacific. He worked below decks, perfecting running the engine as clean as possible to eliminate any visible smoke from exiting the chimney. He told his children that although his ship saw action, being below decks he often didn't know they'd been fired on. His scariest day came when on VJ Day, shipmates dared him to dive into Subic Bay from the highest point of the ship. After the dive, he realized the bay was full of debris, and he could have been seriously injured the day the war was won.

When John returned to the United States in June 1946, he got a near-perfect score on the Naval Fleet exam, earning him an appointment to Annapolis. John preferred to stay close to family in Massachusetts, so ended his career with the military, and immediately applied to engineering schools. MIT, Brown University and UMass accepted him. Because of the enormous number of returning G.I.s at once, MIT and Brown delayed his admittance by a year. John wanted to get his career going, so chose to attend UMass in the fall of 1946 on the G.I. Bill. His first two years at UMass were taught at their satellite campus at Fort Devens. He graduated in Amherst, MA with a degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1950.

John's cousin, Dotty, set him up on a date with her girlfriend, Jean Scott, also of Worcester. They both worked at the American Red Cross. John and Jean married in November 1950 and remained together happily for 67 years, until his death. John leaves behind two children, and four grandchildren; his daughter Pamela and Glenn Barney of Northborough, MA and their children Scott and Danielle, and his son Scott and Claude, also of Northborough, MA, and their children Michael and John.

Over the course of 30 years, John worked in radar systems engineering on government projects at Raytheon and GTE. His field was to study the effect of shock and vibrations on radar installations, which were bomb-tested in the Mojave Desert in Nevada. The other important projects and programs he worked on included the DEW Line that took him to the Aleutian Islands of Alaska. He worked on radar systems for the Apollo and Mercury moon missions, and his last major project was on the Star Wars program. During these projects he advanced from Lab Manager to Principle Engineer to Chief Engineer, a title that he liked very much. He reveled in telling his family how all his meetings started on time. He would lock the door at the designated start time, and did not allow any latecomers entry. He asked everyone to stand during his meetings in order to run them with precision and efficiency. During his work life, he co-authored several patents.

John loved to draw nudes and cartoons. He called his nudes, "Poor man's Picassos." He would draw cartoons of all his tennis and golf buddies, lampooning their fallibilities. At Christmas, he drew his signature "Ugly Elf" on the gift boxes of each of his grandchildren.

Another favorite pastime was vacationing with family. Having a 32-year retirement, allowed him to reconnect with friends and family and travel widely. He and his wife Jean would vacation regularly on the island of Aruba with his sister Jean and brother-in-law, John. The two Johns would play cribbage daily. John and his sister loved painting the beach scenery and the waves. He treasured these times with his sister. John and his wife Jean would also join their kids and grandkids on vacation on Block nearly every summer, traveled many times with their daughter's family and visited their son's family when they lived in France. The two of them also joined many fascinating Elder Hostel trips in the U.S. and abroad. For several years they went to Navy reunions as member of the Patrol Craft Sailors' Association. They've lived in the same home in Northborough since 1955, and with their entire family in the same town, being consummate babysitters, and constant traffic through their home, John and Jean remained young at heart.

He will be deeply missed by all of us! He lived a great, long life and went out exactly the way he wanted to, not that he was ever ready to leave us.