Jonathan T. Weber

Jonathan Thomas Weber, a lifelong Cincinnatian, died suddenly on Tuesday, August 4, 2026, at the age of 87. He was born in Cincinnati on December 20, 1938.

Jon was the fourth generation of a Cincinnati family that has worked in the machine tool trade since the 1870s. His great-grandfather, William Lodge, a Leeds-trained machinist and a member of the Machine Tool Hall of Fame, founded the Lodge & Shipley Company in 1892. Jon's father, Louis L. Weber, led the Special Products Division of Lodge & Shipley, where Jon became the division's first - and ultimately last - co-op engineering student.

Jon graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 1961 with a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering, earned through the university's cooperative education program. Commissioned that year in the Field Artillery, he served two years on active duty as a lieutenant at Fort Hood, Texas, and continued in the United States Army Reserve, retiring with the rank of major. He remained a member of the 5th Battalion, 28th Field Artillery Association.

Following the completion of his MBA at Harvard Business School, Jon returned to Cincinnati and devoted his professional life to the machine tool industry. He acquired Positrol Tool Company in 1969 and welcomed his brother David to the business in 1975. Over the next forty years the brothers built Positrol Workholding into a leading international manufacturer of custom workholding solutions. A gifted innovator and respected industry leader, Jon held multiple patents on workholding equipment and served on the Association for Manufacturing Technology's workholding standards committee from its inception, helping to advance the manufacturing profession he loved.

Jon was a longtime member of the Oriental Order of Groundhogs, Cincinnati's historic fellowship of the machine-tool and metalworking trades. He was a faith-filled Catholic, providing sacramental ministry to several parishes and a local hospital. He will be dearly missed by his many good friends at Guardian Angels Church and St. Francis Xavier Church in Cincinnati.

The youngest of three brothers, Jon was preceded in death by his parents, Louis L. Weber and Rose Helen (Schorr) Weber, and by his brothers, L. Lodge Weber II and David C. Weber. He is survived by his sisters-in-law, Daphine Gilbert Weber and Kathleen Stare Weber.

He was the loving uncle of L. Lodge (Caprice) Weber III of Fort Lauderdale, FL; George (Mickie) Weber of Wolverine Lake, MI; Jeffrey (Kimberly) Weber of Hardeeville, SC; Cally (Don) Eckhoff of Loveland, OH; Theresa (Mark) Bengel, David A. (Lisa) Weber, Michael (Jenifer) Weber, Reverend James Weber, Angela (David) Ficker, and Eric (Marian) Weber, all of Cincinnati, OH; Katrina (Jeffrey) Klein and Victoria (Joseph) Hahn, both of St. Louis, MO; and the late Christopher Weber. He is also survived by 31 grand-nieces and grand-nephews and 21 great-grand-nieces and great-grand-nephews. To all of them he was simply Uncle Jon, or JT.

Visitation will be held Friday, August 21, 2026, at 10:00 a.m., followed by a Mass of Christian Burial at 11:00 a.m., at St. Cecilia Catholic Church, Cincinnati, with his nephew, Reverend James Weber, as celebrant. Interment will follow at Spring Grove Cemetery, with military honors.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to St. Cecilia Catholic School.