John Mering remembered John Vollmer Mering, age 78, Tucson, Ariz., died on Monday, Aug. 3. John was born in 1931 in Kansas City, Mo. He attended Pembroke County Day School in Kansas City. He graduated from the University of Missouri, Columbia, in 1953, and he received his Doctorate of Philosophy in History from that institution in 1960. The title of his dissertation, which he completed under the direction of Professor Lewis Atherton, is "The Whig party in Missouri." Mering's book with that same title appeared in 1967. From 1954 to 1956, he served as a lieutenant in the Artillery of the United States Army. In 1969, Mering came to Tucson as a Professor of History at the University of Arizona, where he remained until he became Professor Emeritus in 1993. Between 1960 and 1969, he held faculty positions at UND and the University of Florida. In 1954, he married. John's survivors are his four children, Clay Westfall Mering and his wife, Laurie of Tucson; Ellen Curtis Mering of Tucson; Margaret Vollmer Mering and her husband, Duncan Case of Lincoln, Neb.; and Sallie Rollins Mering and her husband, Steve West of Corvallis, Ore.; his three grandchildren are Alden, Vatika and Eli. Mering's parents were Clara Vollmer Mering and Ray Delaplane Mering of Kansas City, Mo. and Great Bend, Kan. Mering's two living sisters are Jean Quinn of Kansas City and Virginia McDonald of Miami Lakes, Fla. Memorials may be made to St. Philip's, or to the American Civil Liberties Union, 125 Broad Street, 18th floor, New York, NY 10004, www.aclu.org.