Stephen Ray Fisher

Stephen R. Fisher died on February 3, 2022, in Crystal Lake, Ill. Born October 5, 1935, in Sturgis, Mich., Steve was the youngest of six – and the only child of Ray G. and Mary (Seaney) Fisher to be born in a hospital, rather than at the family’s home in LaGrange County, Indiana. (His mother often joked that had she considered the implications of that short trip across the state line, she would have stayed home rather than let Steve be born a “Wolverine.”)

Music was an important part of Steve’s early life, from the Lutheran church choir, to a high school barbershop quartet that performed throughout LaGrange County, to Purdue’s Varsity Glee Club -- where performances meant donning white tie and tails and travel to venues ranging from the Hollywood Bowl to the Ed Sullivan Show in New York, the 1956 Eisenhower Inaugural festivities, and Bob Hope’s USO Christmas show in Alaska. Though his career would keep Steve from the church choir as an adult, his love of choral and classical music endured, and helped instill a love of music in his children.

Steve graduated from Purdue in 1957 with a degree in Forestry, after completing the Army ROTC program and more importantly, meeting Patricia Klopfenstein, his future wife. The couple were married the following year in South Bend, after Pat graduated and Steve obtained his Army Aviator Wings. Over the ensuing decade, they moved 12 times. Army posts gave way to graduate studies -- interrupted for the better part of a year by a recall to active duty during the Berlin Wall crisis, and then resumed when Steve used GI Bill benefits to complete a M.B.A. at Purdue. Steve then worked at Mead Paper Co. before becoming a flight engineer with United Airlines, where he went on to a nearly-thirty-year career, retiring in September 1995 as Captain on the Boeing 767.  

Steve and Pat raised their family in Harvard, Ill. Whatever satisfaction he took from music, flying, or other pursuits, family was always Steve’s top priority. Above all, he was fiercely loyal and generous to his parents, his siblings and their families, to his wife and their three children. He was proud of them, quick to jump to their defense, and ever-driven by a desire to provide for them. 

Steve is survived by his wife Pat; his three children -- Mike (and wife Christy Lopez), Jennifer (and husband Mike Orlet), and Paul (and wife Caroline); his seven grandchildren, and his sister, Nancy Petrich, of West Lafayette. His family is grateful to the wonderful staff at the Bickford in Crystal Lake, who ensured that he was safe and well-cared for over several years, after his Alzheimer’s disease had reached an advanced stage. 

The family will hold a memorial service at the Greenwood Cemetery in LaGrange later this year. 

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