John Frazier Hoover Jr.

John Frazier Hoover passed away on April 27, 2026 in Austin, Texas at the age of 67. John was born on October 10, 1958 in Fort Worth, Texas to John Frazier Hoover, Sr. and Lois Minter Hoover, and he was lucky to have a loving brother, Brad, who was 12 years older.

John is survived by his wife, Julie Barnett Hoover, and his son, Sean Macleod Hoover, as well as his sister-in-law Laurie Hoover and his niece Elizabeth Wall.

John led an interesting and varied life that included travel, unusual work and hobbies, and volunteering. John grew up mostly in Dallas, Texas, but for a time also lived in El Dorado, Arkansas when his father started a furniture company there. John attended high school at both Highland Park High School in Dallas and Hawaii Preparatory Academy in Waimea, Hawaii before graduating from Highland Park in 1977.

After high school John attended Southwest Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas, where he took up competitive fencing with the recreational sports club there, making lifelong friends in the process. John left SWT to attend Florida Institute of Technology’s Underwater Technology program in Jensen Beach, Florida, and from there went to Aberdeen, Scotland, ultimately to work for several marine construction and drilling companies while progressing from dive tender to sat systems technician, diver, and inspection diver.

When policy changes in 1988 made continuing to work in the UK impossible, John returned to America and studied Economics at the University of Texas at Dallas. He worked at United MediCorp and Film Bank before eventually joining the Texas Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit as a Medicaid Fraud Investigator in Austin.

It was at this time, the fall of 1993, that John met his future wife Julie at the home of a mutual friend. John and Julie hit it off immediately and tied the knot February 22, 1997. They moved into a new house a year later, and their happiness was completed by the addition of their son Sean on January 23, 2001.

Throughout these years John kept his interest in diving. He became a member of the Historical Diving Society, an international group of people dedicated to maintaining and diving historical equipment. John also founded a local group called the Undersea Heritage and Exploration Society to dive old equipment and also participate in marine archeology expeditions, most notably the search for the Invincible, the flagship of the Republic of Texas Navy.

After leaving the Attorney General’s office John turned his hand to a variety of interests, such as building a two-seater wooden kayak, becoming a Boy Scout pack leader, and volunteering on a search-and-rescue team.

Many of John’s experiences came together when Russia invaded Ukraine in February of 2022 and John was off to volunteer in Ukraine a few months later, taking along a duffle bag full of medical supplies. He spent most of the next three years in Ukraine volunteering in a variety of ways, including as an emergency first responder, doing search and rescue, training others in first aid and search and rescue, and connecting funders with grassroots organizations needing support.

Those who knew John knew someone who had a sense of adventure, a desire to help others, and a gift for throwing himself fully into things he was passionate about. He will be deeply missed by his family and all those he touched.