Visual problems kept him out of the military during World War II, although he served in the Merchant Marine. He graduated from Princeton in 1945 with a major in English, and in 1957 received a Ph.D. in experimental psychology from UC, Berkeley.
Following that, Trevor was a lecturer at Harvard for four years, a professor of psychology at the University of Pittsburgh for nine years, and professor and chairman of the psychology department at Bethany College in West Virginia. He was at Bethany for 23 years, until his retirement in 1988. He initiated the academic computer center at Bethany, where he continued to work for 10 years as professor emeritus.
Trevor leaves his wife, Janice; two children, Cheshire and John Trevor III; and his brothers, Everett L. ’49 and Neal ’54.