A Magazine for Alumni and Friends
Andrew Mark Huntley Fryer passed away on June 24. He was 29 years old. Remembered as generous and loving, Fryer grew up in Waterdown, Ontario before moving to Waterloo and attending Laurier. During his time at university, he served as director of the Wilfrid Laurier University Students’ Union board and vice-president of Sigma Chi fraternity. Among his many interests, Fryer possessed a lifelong love of sailing and served as a captain of the tall ship STV Pathfinder.
Former chemistry professor Raymond Andrew Heller passed away on Aug. 27. He was 81 years old. Heller earned a PhD in chemistry from University of California, Berkeley and inspired many students during a three-decade career at Laurier. He was well-known for taking any event and turning it into a story worth re-telling. Heller will be remembered for his love of travel, reading and his children.
Newton Arthur Thomas passed away on April 8. He was 93 years old. A Second World War veteran, Thomas enlisted in the Princess Louise Dragoon Guards, Canadian Army Corps in 1944 and went overseas in September the same year. In 1945 he was flown to Brussels, Belgium where his unit fought its way into Holland and on to Amsterdam. It was there that Thomas met his late wife Adriana, when she and a friend were lifted onto his vehicle to help direct troops to the city’s Olympic Stadium. Thomas spent his childhood in New Hamburg, Ontario and returned there following the war to open a law office after graduating with a bachelor of arts degree from Laurier’s predecessor, Waterloo Lutheran University, and Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto.
Wilfred Gregory Tschirhart passed away on Sept. 20. He was 96 years old. Born in Kitchener, Tschirhart grew up on a farm in Haysville, Ontario during the Great Depression. He was forced to leave school after Grade 10, becoming a carpenter to help support his family. Tschirhart always longed to attain a university degree and did just that after retirement from a successful career in construction and building design. He attended Laurier, earning a bachelor of arts degree in 1993, honours bachelor of arts in 1999, master’s in 2002 and PhD in 2009, all in the field of geography and environmental studies. At age 88 he became the third-oldest person to achieve a doctorate from an accredited university. Tschirhart also served in the Canadian Armed Forces, Royal Canadian Engineers, during the Second World War, achieving the rank of sergeant major. After the war he earned a structural engineering certificate and served as a designer and construction foreman on hockey arena projects throughout Ontario. Laurier’s Elizabeth Tschirhart Award for geography and environmental studies students is named in honour of Tschirhart’s wife.