Jonathan Temple Deutsch, 24, a 1997 graduate of Churchill High School, died Oct. 16 in Knoxville, Tenn. after a car accident in nearby Sevierville.
Deutsch was traveling to Nashville to visit with family and friends while relocating from Arlington, Va. to California, where he intended to work in the entertainment industry before attending law school in the fall of 2003.
BORN IN Washington, D.C., Deutsch grew up in Kensington and Potomac where he attended Beverly Farms Elementary and Hoover Middle School before graduating from Churchill High School in 1997. In high school, Deutsch was a peer counselor and a member of the National Honor Society, played jazz piano and varsity football, and volunteered at the Potomac Community Center. He was a National Merit Finalist and a Maryland Scholar and was honored as the Churchill varsity football athlete with the highest academic achievement. During the summers, he worked as a site manager for Norman’s Farm Market.
DEUTSCH GRADUATED from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a bachelor's degree in international studies in December 2000 after spending an honors semester in London.
Upon graduation from UNC Chapel Hill, he spent several months with his parents in California, tending bar and playing the piano at Miramar Beach Restaurant in Half Moon Bay.
Deutsch moved to Crystal City, Va. in the fall of 2001 and worked as a reporter and entertainment critic for On Tap Newspaper. Deutsch then became an associate at the Information Technology Institute, a trade association in Washington, D.C., where he led research and analysis projects for business and technology trends.
Survivors include his parents Don and Martha Deutsch of Half Moon Bay, Calif.; brother Erik and sister Emily Deutsch of Boulder, Colo.; grandmother Eleanore Deutsch and aunt Judy Ward of Deale, Md.; and grandmother Josephine Crutcher and aunt Joyce Ward of Nashville, Tenn.
* Memorial services were held on Saturday, Oct. 19 at Saint Francis Episcopal Church in Potomac. Contributions to honor his memory may be made to the Jonathan T. Deutsch Musical Arts Memorial Fund c/o Potomac Community Center Advisory Board, 11315 Falls Road, Potomac, Md. 20854.