GREEN BURIAL AT GREEN-WOOD CEMETERY IN BROOKLYN

John Walton Barker was buried simply and elegantly in an earth-friendly willow casket in Green-Wood Cemetery, October, 2019. Dr. Barker was born in Brooklyn and was the proud owner of a Green-Wood family plot, so it made sense to bring him home from Madison, Wisconsin, where he’d happily served as a distinguished professor of history for more than 30 years.

He was dedicated to the history of Medieval Europe, with teaching and research specialities in Byzantine, the Crusades, as well as Venetian history and civilization. In 1975 he helped found the Byzantine Studies Conference (now the Byzantine Studies Association of North America), which continues to be the main venue for presenting current research on Byzantine studies in the western hemisphere. He hosted the second Byzantine Studies Conference in 1976 and the 23rd in 1997. He and his wife traveled extensively and, for a good decade, he led educational tours to Turkey, Greece, Italy, and especially Sicily.

Barker was a devoted connoisseur of classical music, especially opera and oratorio, with a particular devotion to the oratorios of Handel.  He was a reviewer for the American Record Guide for 62 years and collected over 110,000 classical music recordings. He wrote extensive music criticism for local Madison journals, and since 2001 was a staff reviewer for Isthmus. For over three decades he was a regular broadcaster on recorded music for WHA/WERN Public Radio, and for the past 18 years was a monthly host on WORT’s “Musica Antiqua.” He was a co-founder of UW Opera Props and between 1981 and 2006 produced 61 issues of “The Prompter,” extended journals for the University opera productions. In addition, he sang in several local choirs including the choir at the Assumption Greek Orthodox Church in Madison for 47 years.

He is survived by his wife, Margaret (born Grabowski). He is buried in the Coughlin family plot at Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn where he joins his ancestor Thomas Joralemon (c. 1776—1850) and where his neighbors include Leonard Bernstein, Louis Moreau Gottschalk, as well as other notables.