Dr. Frederick "Fred" Donnelly

It is with great sadness the family announces the sudden passing of Frederick “Fred” Donnelly on Saturday, November 1, 2014 at the Saint John Regional Hospital.   He is survived by his children, Sandra (Stephen Tobias) of Saint John, James (Julie Henderson) of Kelowna BC, and his four grandchildren; William, Alexander, Sarah, and Miles.  He is predeceased by his wife, Marilyn, in 2012 and his brother, Alan.  Born October 27th, 1946 in Montreal, Quebec, Fred was the son of the late Truman and Sarah Donnelly.  A graduate of Lachine High School, and Carleton University in Ottawa, he received a PHD in Social History from Sheffield University in Sheffield, England in 1975.  He was a professor of History at the University of Alberta before moving to Rothesay, New Brunswick in 1979 to join the faculty of the University of New Brunswick in Saint John as Professor of British History.  He also served as Chair of the History & Politics Dept. (1996-2003), and Asst/Associate Dean Graduate Studies (1990-96).  Over the course of his distinguished career he was recognized with many awards and honours including Teaching Awards from the Department of History and Politics, and the President’s Medal for Outstanding Career Contributions in 2011. Since his retirement in 2012, he held honourary positions as Research Associate at the New Brunswick Museum, and Research Professor at UNBSJ.  Fred was an avid reader with an extensive personal library, a lover of classic movies, and fan of music from the Beatles to opera.  As a freelance writer and columnist, he published close to 1,000 articles, columns, commentaries, op-eds for many publications including the Telegraph Journal, CAA Magazine, TroyMedia, and Albion Magazine (UK).  His writings covered a broad range of topics from travel writing, book reviews, and humour, to historical and international perspectives on popular cultural issues.  Fred was a world traveller who sought any and all opportunities to discover places with fascinating cultural history.  In the last two years, he enjoyed wonderful trips to a number of destinations both near and far including Southeast Asia, New Mexico, the Okanagan wine region in BC, Italy, Istanbul, the Magdalen Islands, Iceland, Switzerland, and Scotland.  Just last week, he had returned from a river cruise on the Rhine.  Above all, his pride and joy were his children and grandchildren.  Fred will also be sadly missed by brothers Graham (Leslie) of Montreal, Quebec and Malcolm of Kingston, Ontario; mother-in-law Georgiana Johnston  of Port-of-Spain, Trinidad; brothers-in-law Keith Johnston (Oylan) of Toronto and David Johnston of Los Gatos, California; and sisters-in-law Helen Rignault of Calgary, Janice Johnston of Toronto, and Catherine Henry of Lynchburg, Virginia and many nephews and nieces. Resting at Fundy Funeral Home, 230 Westmorland Road, Saint John (646-2424) with visiting on Friday from 6-8 pm and Saturday from 2-4 pm only. A celebration of Fred’s life will be held from the Fundy Funeral Home Chapel on Sunday at 1:00 pm. For those who wish, remembrances to a charity of the donor’s choice would be appreciated by the family. Online condolences may be placed at www.fundyfuneralhome.com

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