Michael David Nicklanovich was born in Virginia City, Nevada, on May 26, 1941. He died in Lovelock, Nevada, on May 31, 2015, just days after his 74th birthday.
His family left Virginia City for Reno where Mike entered grade school. In Lovelock, he completed his schooling and graduated from Pershing County High School, Valedictorian of the Class of 1959.
Completing both B.S. and M.S. degrees from the University of Nevada-Reno, the young biologist then accepted a position at Miami-Dade Junior College in Miami, Florida. He retired in 1996 after thirty years of teaching biology and medical terminology at the then-largest junior college in the United States.
A passionate scientist, he was fascinated by the natural world which he famously explored on frequent long hikes, as at home in the Florida everglades as in the northern Nevada desert.
At his retirement, Miami-Dade’s newspaper said, “He is known as a man of science, but he is actually a man of letters.” Indeed, he wrote a popular and widely-adopted biology textbook, From Cell to Philosopher (Prentice-Hall: 1973). He was one of the select few to meet with the British scholar Dr. Jacob Bronowsky in preparations for the BBC’s 1973 Ascent of Man series.
Michael Nicklanovich was likely even more passionate about poetry. He recited classics from memory and wrote poetry throughout his life. Some of his collected works were published as was his epic Sun Prayer in Ragtime (Wake-Brook House: 1977).
After retirement, he lived in Tucson, Arizona, where he wrote feature articles for Serb World U.S.A. Magazine, covering diverse subjects: several histories of Serbs in American steel mill towns —Aliquippa, Pennsylvania (1996); Gary, Indiana (1998); etc.; a series on Serbs and their herbs—including “Rosemary is for Remembrance” (1998); and in-depth articles about historical figures—“Constantinople’s Last Emperor” (1999), for example.
In 2002, he retired for a second time and returned to Lovelock and the desert to hike the places he had roamed and hunted as a boy.
Michael D. Nicklanovich was preceded in death by his parents, Andrew M. and Mary Nicklanovich. He is survived by his brother, Dr. Mark A. Nicklanovich of Santa Cruz, California; his sister, Mary Nicklanovich Hart of Tucson, Arizona; and his true friend of over 50 years, Massoud “Mac” Moezzi of Lovelock.
