John Mason Obituary, Death – On January 3, 2023, John Mason passed away when he was a patient at the Rock River Hospice and Residence in Sterling, Illinois. On April 30th, 1941, he was born in Morrison, Illinois, to parents named Robert and Cecile Mason. He spent his childhood on a farm and went to one-room country schools up until the eighth grade with his closest friends and cousins, Jeanne and Jane, who were also his classmates.
Even though he hadn’t worked the land in decades, he never stopped thinking of himself as a farmer, and he was always happy to share anecdotes about his life on the farm. He was proud of the fact that he had been a member of the Morrison High School Class of 1959 and that he had attended a sporting event hosted by Morrison High School each and every year of his life. His marriage to a woman whose maiden name was Baker took place on July 23, 1965, and the couple and their daughter Amy relocated to Hinckley in 1971. He taught United States History and Government at Hinckley, Dight, and Sandwich junior high schools.
At Malta High School, he was also the instructor of a service learning class that won an award. He took great pleasure in motivating pupils to increase their knowledge of the Constitution and the governance of the United States. Teaching was a passion of his, but coaching was even more of a driving force in his life. During the course of his 56-year coaching career, he was a basketball coach for both boys and girls at various times. He began his career in Hinckley and then moved on to Dwight, Sandwich, Malta, Aurora Central Catholic, Ohio, Paw Paw, Hinckley-Big Rock, Genoa-Kingston, Lamoille, and North Boone. His career spanned 56 years. It was on the occasion of his 70th birthday that he was admitted into the Hall of Fame of the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association.