Former Bainbridge Island resident Aaron Palmer Lord, 41, died April 2 in Eugene, Ore.

He was born May 27, 1960 in Queens, N.Y., to Richard and Merrylee Lord. He grew up in New York, and moved with his family to Bainbridge Island in 1978.

Able to read and write at age 3, he pursued his own education, asking his mother while he was still in first grade when he could legally drop out of school.

He sat in on his first college course while in third grade, and left public schools at age 16. He attended Tompkins Community College and Ithaca College in New York, studying filmmaking, art and music.

After moving to the Northwest, he spent two years on a crab boat in Alaska, and also went panning for gold in that state. He held various jobs in the Bainbridge area, including stints at the Domsea fish farm, in the mail room at Kitsap Newspaper Group, and as film critic for a small Seattle publication.

He lived for several years at the Driftwood Apartments on South Beach, and while there did T-shirt designs, played guitar and sold some of his photos and prints.

He was a devotee of science fiction and cult films, and was an extra on the set of “Jaws 2.” He also enjoyed horror fiction, and maintained a collection of early editions by writer H.P. Lovecraft and others in the genre.

He was a friend of science fiction author Ray Bradbury — one of Lord’s prints was included in a Bradbury book — and was a one-time “drinking buddy” of Norman Mailer while in Cape Cod, Mass.

He was also a devotee of the Buddhist faith, and taped for distribution the lectures of the Dalai Lama during his visit to Seattle in 1993.

He moved to Oregon six years ago, living at a Buddhist temple in Cottage Grove before settling in Eugene to pursue his art and other interests in the university environment.

He is survived by his parents, Richard Lord of Bainbridge Island and Merrylee Lord of Lemolo; brother Brian Alan Lord of Kingston; sisters April Ellingsen of Poulsbo, and Heather Romero of Federal Way; grandparents Ruth and B.J. Manning of Cortland, N.Y.; and four nieces and three nephews.

A memorial service will be held at 1 p.m. June 8 at the Filipino American Community Hall on Bainbridge Island.