Steve Jobs' biological father was Syrian migrant, some note

Edward C. Baig | USA TODAY

NEW YORK—Steve Jobs biological father was from Syria, a fact that has not been lost on the Twittersphere, especially in the wake of the Syrian refugee crisis, and now the horrific massacre in Paris.

Even before the latest violence, Syrian migration has been a hotbed issue throughout Europe and in the U.S.

And some people couldn’t help but turn to Twitter, wondering if there would ever be a Steve Jobs or Apple if the most restrictive "keep-them-out" policies were in place.

“Those who propose sweeping bans on refugees might want to consider this: Steve Jobs was the son of a Syrian migrant,” tweeted The Nation writer John Nichols @NicholsUprising.

"Worthy reminder: Steve Jobs biological father was also a #SyrianRefugee," tweeted Hanna Norberg, a Swedish trade economist.

Steve Jobs’ biological father, Abdulfattah “John” Jandali, was born in 1931 to a prominent Syrian family, the youngest of nine children. He grew up in Homs, Syria, a city since ravaged by the nation’s civil war.

According to the authorized Steve Jobs biography written by Walter Isaacson, in the early 1950s, Jandali went to study at the American University in Beirut, and eventually on to the University of Wisconsin.

While serving in Wisconsin as a teaching assistant, he met the woman who would become Steve Jobs’ biological mother, Joanne Schieble.

Jandali and Schieble would eventually marry, but not until they put the future co-founder of Apple up for adoption, the year he was born, in 1955. The couple later had a daughter as well, the writer Mona Simpson.

In the Jobs biography, Isaacson writes that they initially decided not to get married because Schieble’s father, who was dying at the time, “threatened to disown her if she wed Abdulfattah.”

Years later, Jobs would “bristle whenever anyone referred to Paul and Clara Jobs as his `adoptive’ parents or implied that they were not his `real’ parents,” Isaacson wrote. Jobs, who died in 2011, instead referred to his biological parents as “my sperm and egg bank.”

Jandali ended up in Nevada, working in the restaurant business. That's where he apparently met his son by happenstance, though he didn't know it at the time.

Jobs told Issacson that he didn’t have any interest in meeting his biological father, though Simpson eventually tracked him down. And one of the most fascinating reveals in the Isaacson book comes in an episode in where Jandali tells Simpson that “he wished she could have seen him when he was managing a Mediterranean restaurant north of San Jose. `That was a wonderful place,’ he said. “All of the successful technology people used to come there. Even Steve Jobs.’ “

Isaacson writes that Steve Jobs did maintain a friendly relationship with his biological mother, who after divorcing Jandali remarried for a short time to ice skating instructor George Simpson.

And Jandali, who is still living, has been married four times.

In a 2011 interview published by the Lebanese site, Ya Libnan, Jandali talked about his kids. “Steve is my biological son, but I didn’t bring him up, and he has a family that adopted him. So if it’s said that I’m the ‘father of invention’, then that’s because my biological son is a genius and my daughter a brilliant writer. I thank God for my success in life, but I’m no inventor….I’m proud of my son and his accomplishments, and of my work. Of course I made mistakes, and if I could go back in time I would have put some things right. I would have been closer to my son, but all’s well that ends well. Steve Jobs is one of the most successful people in America, and Mona is a successful academic and novelist.”

Email: ebaig@usatoday.com; Follow USA TODAY Personal Tech Columnist @edbaig on Twitter