(1928-2011)

Who Was Jack Kevorkian?

Jack Kevorkian was a pathologist who assisted people suffering from acute medical conditions in ending their lives. After years of conflict with the court system over the legality of his actions, he spent eight years in prison after a 1999 conviction. Kevorkian's actions spurred national debate on the ethics of euthanasia and hospice care.

Early Life

Jack Kevorkian was born Murad Kevorkian on May 26, 1928, in Pontiac, Michigan, the second of three children born to Armenian immigrants Levon and Satenig Kevorkian. Kevorkian's parents were refugees who escaped the Armenian Massacres that occurred shortly after World War I. Levon was smuggled out of Turkey by missionaries in 1912 and made his way to Pontiac, Michigan, where he found work at an automobile foundry.

Satenig fled the Armenian death march, finding refuge with relatives in Paris, and eventually reuniting with her brother in Pontiac. Levon and Satenig met through the Armenian community in their city, where they married and began their family. The couple welcomed a daughter, Margaret, in 1926, followed by son Murad -- who later earned the nickname "Jack" by American friends and teachers -- and, finally, third child Flora.

After Levon lost his job at the foundry in the early 1930s, he began making a sizeable living as the owner of his own excavating company -- a difficult feat in Depression-era America. While other families suffered financially, the Kevorkians began living a more comfortable life in a bucolic, multi-cultural suburb in Pontiac. "My parents sacrificed a great deal so that we children would be spared undue privation and misery," Kevorkian later wrote. "There was always enough to eat."