Benjamin Ian Julier died peacefully at home on Nov. 4 with family by his side after a lengthy illness. Born in the summer of 1969 in Laconia, N.H., he and his family moved to Higganum, Conn., where he lived the first 18 years of his life, graduating from Xavier High School in Middletown, Conn., and, later, cum laude, with a degree in English from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in 1998.

Throughout his life, Ian loved to write stories and poems but his greatest interest was in music where he continued to write beautiful lyrics for his own music compositions. Eventually, he decided to go on to law school. He graduated cum laude from Cornell Law School in 2001, having been on Cornell Law Review and won C.A.L.I. Excellence for the Future Awards in both international protection of intellectual property and in family law.

After a year working as a law clerk for Justice Richard Palmer on the Connecticut Supreme Court where he was sworn into the Massachusetts bar, he moved to the Island and practiced law with Daniel J. Larkosh for two years before moving to San Francisco, Calif., where he took and passed the California bar, working for the law offices of Sanford M. Cipinko. For the past four years he lived in Winthrop, commuting to Boston where he was employed by the law firm of Diller and Diller.

Ian loved the fact that he lived by the water in Winthrop, enabling him to develop a new passion for kayaking in the bay before going to work in the morning. It also allowed him frequent visits to the Island where he loved to visit his family and comb the beaches.

Ian will be greatly missed by his many friends and large extended family including his mother and father, Dale and Bob Julier, and his sister, Insley, his Grandma, Ann Walko, numerous aunts and uncles including Margaret and Ken Evans, David Julier, Blair and Melinda Weymouth, Richard and Kathy Weymouth, Sherry and Nat Morison, Lynne and Dave Russell-Johnson, Caroline McDougall and Stevie Westmoreland. He will also be missed by numerous cousins: Catherine Evans, Anna-Lisa and Steve Bruce, Jadend Russell-Johnson, Karina Russell, Joshua and Amanda Morison, Banjo, Kerry and Finn Weymouth, Elliot McDougall-Weymouth, and Tyler, Channing and Blair Weymouth.

There will be a private celebration of his life this coming spring in Connecticut. For their wonderful assistance and gentle care of Ian and his family from the onset, donations may be made in his honor to Hospice of Martha’s Vineyard, P.O. Box 2549, Oak Bluffs MA 02557.