The Reverend “Mac” Elrod, who pursued parallel careers in parish ministry, library science, and social activism, died on 16 June 2016, aged 84.

Jefferson McRee Elrod was born in Gainesville, Georgia, on 23 March 1932 to Angus and Lona McRee Elrod. After a B.A. magna cum laude in history (1952), he pursued dual studies in library science and ministry, doing fieldwork in local black churches and receiving ordination in the AME Church in 1954. Mac and his new spouse, Norma, then spent five years as educational missionaries in Korea.

Back in the U.S., Mac served library positions in Tennessee, Missouri, and Ohio (1961-67). Active in the civil rights movement, he and Norma became more progressive politically and religiously, with mounting distress over U.S. Vietnam war policy, and thus happily moved to Vancouver, BC, where he served as head of the University of British Columbia’s library cataloguing division from 1967 to 1978. After leaving the Methodist church, Mac received UUA ministerial fellowship in 1970 and served churches in the Vancouver area for 12 years until retirement from the parish in 1982. Upon departing UBC, he founded his own company and achieved international renown in the field of library cataloguing.

While raising six children in Canada, Mac and Norma’s home became a center for anti-war activism and a stopping point for hundreds of war objectors. He came out as gay in the 1970s and personally paid for the Canadian Unitarian Council to intervene in the 2004 Canadian Supreme Court hearings on same-sex marriage.

A longtime friend remembers Mac as “an unforgettable character, a committed humanitarian, never afraid to share his opinions nor speak on behalf of social justice and the environment, a friend who made me a better person through knowing him.”

He is survived by spouse Norma, five children, many grandchildren, and one great- grandchild. Memorial donations are encouraged to Doctors Without Borders. Condolences may be sent to Norma Cummins Elrod and/or their daughter Lona Manning.