Dr. Ants Leps – RIP

George Rebane

My friend Ants Leps died last night.  Ants was a lifelong teacher and retired as a professor of mass communications and media from California State University – Northridge where he taught for many years.  His passing is another of those milestones that we now seem to encounter more and more often.

Ants and I met as young boys sometime right after the war in a refugee camp in Geislingen, Germany.  Both of our families had managed the great escape from our native Estonia in 1944 as the Red Army swept in.  Ants’ parents were celebrated Estonian artists.  In the refugee camp his father painted ‘the’ portrait of my father, and also taught him to paint.  Our paths parted in 1949 when the war refugees were accepted by many western countries.  The Leps and Rebane families headed for different parts of America to start their new lives.

Many years later in the 1980s Ants walked up to me at a technical conference after I had finished my talk.  He stuck out his hand and started speaking in Estonian as if we had just parted yesterday in Geislingen.  I did a double take and then we gave each other a hug.  It turned out that we both lived in the LA area, and our friendship was renewed.

Ants was teaching students, journalists, and media producers about the new field of interactive multi-media design, the field in which I was busy as an entrepreneur introducing new technologies.  Those years leading up to the Worldwide Web were hectic and exciting both technically and intellectually.  We met often to talk of possible futures and I was a regular guest lecturer in Ants’ courses.

Both Ants and his wife Virve have been ardent environmentalists and liberal progressives, thereby giving lie to the myth that all escapees from communism are automatically right-wingers.  They were members of the Sierra Club, devoted hikers, and gave of themselves to green causes.

Perhaps we shall meet again.

Comments

[Russ]

George,

Sorry to hear about your friends passing, but this was a great reunion story. I fear we will all meet again with our friends, soon than we want I fear.

[Brian]

George, I'm sorry for the loss of your friend. I'd like to see that portrait, someday, and I'd like to hear more about that great escape. The world's history is so often closer than you'd think.

[Jim Jones]

I'm so sorry hear this. Ants and I were close friends for many years in the 70's. He then worked at Becker CPA.

He, Virve, and I hiked many of times in the S.M mountains, or as he liked to call it " We all went Gallumping in the mountains".

I will always remember him and the fun times we had.