John Browne grew up on a dairy farm in an area of New York rich in Revolutionary War history. Graduating from Washingtonville High School, he studied at Georgia Tech, Louisiana State University, and George Washington University, earning a bachelor's and a master's degree. He served in the United States Navy, followed by a 30-year federal civilian career with the Department of the Navy. In semi-retirement, he worked as a freelance writer and pursued interests in Northern Virginia history, mapping/geographic information systems (GIS), and website development. In 2005, he joined as a volunteer Fairfax County, Virginia's A Look Back At Braddock (ALBB) history project and served as the Mapping Committee chair and as maps author of the book Braddock's True Gold; 20th-Century Life in the Heart of Fairfax County. He managed support by the George Mason University Geography Department GIS Center in developing maps for the book and with Mason's Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media (RRCHNM) in developing the http: //braddockheritage.org/ website to make ALBB's research materials available online. John's commitment to tell The Story of Ravensworth grew out of the ALBB experience and relationships with a helping cadre of local historians. John and his wife Pat moved in 2013 from their quarter acre of former Ravensworth land 35 miles west to Fauquier County, where local history offers new paths to pursue