Deceased February 15, 1993

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In Memory

Richard Dale “Toby” Tyler Jr. died on February 15, 1993, at the Hunterdon Medical Center in Clinton Township, N.J., after an eight-month struggle with cancer.

Toby was one of our class’ best-known and most-liked characters. Roly-poly and prematurely balding, he was the best of Falstaff and Friar Tuck rolled into one, living life with gusto and an appealing, infectious laugh that rolled out to capture everyone around him.

Toby burst on the mental landscape for me freshman year when I happened into the snack bar at Valentine and found a large crowd gathered around a table. In the middle was Toby Tyler. Somebody had bet him he couldn’t eat 21 ice cream sundaes, and there he was proving them wrong, though not without considerable rebellion in his stomach.

It was typical Tyler, his antics, good nature and an appearance older than his years quickly made him well known to everyone, and he was elected our class council president freshman year. He pledged Phi Gamma Chi, where I roomed with him and Peter Schliemann ’67 senior year and got to known him better as well as through working together at Valentine, where he was a gray coat in charge of a dining hall.

Toby lived life fully at Amherst; he loved to talk and drink and think about life, and he unabashedly soaked up all the social experiences that Amherst offered in the 1960s. He was a great companion who always showed concern for others: long before the phrases were coined, he knew all about “networking” with people and “keeping lines of communication open.”

Toby started out pre-med and then switched to psychology. He went on to get a master’s from Harvard Business School and settled into a career in—and a lifelong fascination with—business. It led him through some hard ups and downs, but Toby always saw a bright side and rebounded from adversity.

Toby started working for General Electric and was president of his class in the Financial Management Program of General Electric Co. in Schenectady. There he met and married Mary Jane Salamone, and they moved to settle in Lexington, Mass., working in finance and then his own business.

For the last 11 years, he worked for Fedders Corporation, becoming its chief operating officer and living in Raritan Township. Typically, he involved himself in several volunteer capacities, from little league to the local board of education, and he was a member of the Harvard Club and Immaculate Conception Church in Annandale. Toby and Mary Jane have four sons, Richard Dale, Matthew James, Christopher Frank and Luke Michael.

When Toby was diagnosed with cancer of the esophagus last summer, he began to fight it with his usual optimism. His illness prevented him from coming to our 25th Reunion, which Toby would not otherwise have missed, since he was a strong booster and contributor to the college. His progress was stymied by lung complications, but he recovered from that and seemed to be improving. He was excited about job prospects, having resigned from Fedders to try something new, when he learned about Christmastime that the cancer had spread throughout his body.

During his last two months, Mary Jane says Toby continued to live life the only way he knew, always showing more concern for others than himself, despite the constant pain. When he died February 15, his doctors said they had never experienced such a remarkable patient. In losing Toby Tyler, our class has not only lost a member who left an indelible print on many of our memories, but a good soul.

Andrew Nemethy ‘67