Wayne Keith Andrew, of Blacksburg, died Saturday, Sept. 8, 2024.
Wayne was born in Iowa on June 26, 1939. He grew up in Des Moines, Iowa, where he attended Roosevelt High School and Drake University. He later went on to do graduate work in psychology at the University of Saskatchewan. After graduation, he accepted a faculty position at Brandon University in Manitoba, where he taught for a year before moving to Selkirk College in Castlegar, British Columbia and finally taking a faculty position at the University of Winnipeg. He taught at the University of Winnipeg for 15 years, serving as the Chair of the Psychology Department for the latter part of his tenure there. At various times, he taught Introductory Psychology, Humanistic Psychology, and Research Logic and Inference. One of his many strengths as a faculty member was his ability to help students conquer their fear of statistics. As a researcher, he was fascinated with the issue of consciousness and the mind-body problem.
In 1989, he and his wife, Hilary Lips, moved to southwest Virginia where she held a faculty position at Radford University. There, over a period of 30 years, Wayne did independent computer-related consulting and provided extensive support for the development of the university’s Center for Gender Studies. Propelled by memories of the impact of sexism on his own mother and sister, and aware of its continuing destructive force, Wayne was motivated to devote his time and effort to pushing back against gender stereotyping and discrimination by promoting good gender science and scholarship. He developed and maintained the Center’s website, promoted the Center’s activities, and assisted a number of students with their research. He also provided invaluable support to Hilary in her research and publishing projects.
As a high school student, Wayne was on the track team, and he maintained a lifelong practice of running and jogging. One summer, he worked on a survey crew, where his fleetness of foot came in handy when escaping from irate bulls in farmers’ fields. As a young man, he was an avid downhill skier. He loved hiking, especially in the desert; he and Hilary hiked the Grand Canyon several times and enjoyed walking the desert trails in and around Tucson. His recreational reading included many books on quantum physics. He was always very helpful to friends and family struggling to get their computers to do their bidding. He also took great pride in creating artistic designs on the computer to commemorate milestone events. He had a great sense of humor and enjoyed relating stories about his own adventures and misadventures.
Family was very important to him. He enjoyed spending time with his parents and his siblings and in-laws, and often went to a lot of trouble to connect with his nephews and nieces.
He is survived and dearly missed by his wife of 38 years, Hilary Lips; his sisters Kay Andersen and Janet Kleen (Steve Kleen); his brother Jim Nielsen (Liu Minfang); his sisters-in-law Marian Lips (Kevin Smith) and Karen Lips (Ole Hammarlund); his brother-in-law Tom Lips (Linnéa Rowlatt); his nieces Kristen Hughes (Rob Hughes), Amanda Youngblood (Jaime Youngblood), Samantha Macdonald (Scott Macdonald), Maria Kindrick (Thomas Kindrick), Jennifer Smith, Hilary Smith, Karmen Walther, and Freija Walther (Cody Reaume); his nephews Steve Kleen (Whitney Kleen), Jared Nielsen (Kayla Nielsen), Josh Nielsen (Andrea Nielsen), Jacob Nielsen, James Nielsen, and Leif Hammarlund (Dominique Daoust); his cousins Gail Cooper (Walt Rudolph), Nancy Maschman, Edna Grotjahn-Early (Dennis Early), Tim Eddy, David Eddy (Bree Eddy), Debbie Navarro (Mike Navarro), and Steven Eddy (Nelda Eddy); and numerous grand-nieces and grand-nephews. He was pre-deceased by his parents Delores and Bill Nielsen and his brother-in-law Jonathan Lips.
Date and time for a Celebration of Life will be announced. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to Friends of Saguaro National Park (https://www.friendsofsaguaro.org/ ).
