Cambridge ‘runner’ crosses final finish line

Gene Grant

Any stranger who may have come to the Cambridge Riverside-Central Square area over the past many years asking for directions to “The Runner” would almost certainly have been directed right away to one person — Vernon “Vern” Grant.

Known by many residents as a daily jogger, Vern was a man of outstanding accomplishment in several fields.

A quiet, gentle man, many did not know that Vern was an infantry officer, a ten-year Army veteran discharged with captain’s rank after two full action tours in Vietnam. He lost many troopers and friends in action that he never wanted to talk about.

Vern had extensive training in Europe as a supply sergeant and instruction in Japanese and French. He attended Officer Candidate School and received airborne assault (parachutist) training at Ft. Benning, Ga., as well as special training and assignments in information and communications.

He also received a number of commendations, outstanding performance citations and awards. In June of 1966, he received the Army Commendation Medal for meritorious service in Japan as a deputy information officer and command information officer.

Vern also served in Vietnam. On February 4, 1967, he took command in Saigon of the First Signal Brigade’s 400-man security force, providing security for 23 communication sites covering the entire Republic of Vietnam, requiring frequent helicopter flights from one hotspot to another.

Also a lifelong artist of special skills honed and sharpened at the Vesper George School of Art, Vern was later employed to great acclaim as a regularly-featured cartoonist for the widely distributed military publication Stars and Stripes. While attending Tokyo’s Sophia University after his discharge, he wrote and drew for English language newspapers like the Mainichi Daily News.

While living in Japan, Vern also published a fast selling, highly popular military series entitled “Point-Man Palmer” and a two-book satirical work called “A Monster is Loose in Tokyo.” In initiatives uncommon for that time, after returning home to Cambridge, he published a science fiction series, “The Love Rangers.” He was known across the country in cartooning circles and possessed extensive knowledge of and experience in the Japanese form of cartooning called “manga,” a more serious cultural format than American comics.

But his passion of over forty years was his running, always thoughtful and planned. He was usually accompanied by Betsy Reese-Grant, his wife and closest companion for 34 years. Vern approached his running with the same dogged determination that brought him through the dark days in Vietnam. In his life, he completed 27 marathons, as well as scores of other shorter competitions.

The irony, or perhaps the victory, of Vernon Grant’s story is that on Friday, July 7, while out on another run, he suffered the heart attack and fall that would end his running — and, some days later, end his life. In a deep coma from which he never awakened, with Betsy constantly at his side, “The Runner” crossed his final finish line on Sunday morning, July 23.