David Fitch Kahn

David Fitch Kahn, of Gaithersburg, Maryland, passed away in his sleep on his favorite chair during the early hours of September 11, 2026. He was 84.

David taught social studies for 36 years at Gaithersburg High School and had been telling all of his doctors that he expected to live until 96, so he could also have 36 years of retirement. When recommending the benefits of retirement to others, he would sometimes say that choosing to retire was his best decision. But he knew that the best decision he ever made was marrying his wife of 55 years, artist and renowned Jewish children’s book illustrator Katherine Janus Kahn. They met on the first day of college and lived together in Bethesda and Wheaton until her death last autumn. Her artwork—ceramics, sculpture, and paintings, including many self-portraits—filled their house and yards, and later lined his apartment.

David was born on July 28, 1942, in Bristol, Virginia-Tennessee, the only son of Myrle Silverman Kahn, a multi-lingual public servant, and Robert "Bert" Kahn, an aeronautical engineer. The family moved from Bristol to Queens to Hartford and West Hartford, and then cross-country to Los Angeles. He attended college at the University of Chicago, concentrating in history and captaining the fencing team; his interest in bladed weapons would over time become more utilitarian, as he could always be trusted to have a pocketknife handy. While at Chicago, he participated in the students' on-field protest of the attempted return of collegiate football to the University asserting, presciently, that the commercialization of college athletics was incompatible with the intellectual pursuits of higher education.

After returning to California for graduate studies in law and history, David moved east to Maryland, getting a job teaching high school social studies the week before school started in 1967. Although he had never figured on being a teacher, David quickly found that he enjoyed teaching through dialogues with his students. He taught every social studies course offered at Gaithersburg, but loved American history the most. He later became the head of the social studies department at Gaithersburg and had the good fortune to teach multiple generations of students.

David was an activist for civil rights, participating in the Freedom Summer voter registration drives in Mississippi. He also advocated for workers’ rights; as a first-year teacher, he helped organize the 1968 Montgomery County Teachers’ Strike, which resulted in a state law guaranteeing collective bargaining rights for teachers. As a result of that experience, David became an organizer and leader for the Montgomery County Education Association. He also remained an activist championing social justice; he was arrested and jailed with the Reverend Jesse Jackson while protesting South African apartheid. After retiring from teaching, he continued his life of service by working for Maryland State Senator Paul Pinsky.

David enjoyed his leisure time: He was an avid reader, especially science fiction, fantasy, and detective novels, and a huge film buff, loving such disparate movies as Casablanca, Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday, Kill Bill, and Ratatouille. He was a huge baseball fan, first of the Brooklyn Dodgers; then, since they followed him to the West Coast, the Los Angeles Dodgers; and finally his hometown Washington Nationals, who he supported fanatically.  He watched every Nats game, including attending their historic Wild Card victory, as well as a World Series game during the championship season of 2019. Growing up immersed in Southern California car culture, David loved sports cars, enjoying the adrenaline rush while driving and dreaming of his next ride.

A connoisseur of fine food, he was lucky enough to be married to a fantastic cook. Like Kathy, he was a coffee aficionado, going so far as to import an espresso machine from Italy in the 1990s. In his retirement, the two traveled frequently, visiting the Netherlands, Italy, Turkey, Greece, and the Balkans and enjoying leisurely river cruises of the wine regions of France.

David loved dogs, frequently recounting fond memories of his beloved childhood dachshunds, Rusty and Reggie, and deeply loving the family’s charismatic poodle, Sassy, and his son’s dogs Snow and Styx.

He is survived by his son Robert of Washington, DC, and cousins from Cape Cod to California. In lieu of flowers, please support your local teachers, the arts, and progressive causes.