Stephen B. Andrus

Stephen B. Andrus died peacefully at home September 17, 2015. He was briefly predeceased by his wife of 71 years BJ Andrus, survived by three daughters, grandson and feline factotum, Luke. Born in Minnesota, his first big adventure was a highschool-led bicycling tour of UK and onto Germany. Attending the 1936 Olympics, he watched Jesse Owens’ gold medal races. He came east for college, Haverford, and medical school, Johns Hopkins.

While there he met Elizabeth Browning who was working as a medical illustrator in Helen Taussig’s department. After their marriage and a move to Manhattan, he began work at Bellevue Hospital in 1944. Contracted tuberculosis necessitating treatment at Trudeau Sanatorium in Saranac , NY. Their next move was to Boston and his to work at Boston City Hospital. Stephen was a very curious person. He asked many questions when processing new concepts. He was intrigued by everything wanting to know how and why and the reason for everything. His scientific mind was always probing and his aesthetic eye always appreciating. His memory was wonderful if sometimes elastic. We grew up hearing stories about his childhood, family, an extended circle of relatives, friends and animals. Decades after medical school he retained the vocabulary of the body and of disease. You might overhear him on the phone discussing a friend’s disease with all that terminology. He was careful and thorough in his projects. Following years as a research pathologist at the Harvard School of Public Health, he was lured into the world of fine art printing, book-making, and drawing, ART!, by the artist George

Lockwood. After presenting a paper in London, he began a sabbatical. When the Lockwoods moved to Pembroke, Steve took over Impressions Workshop on Stanhope Street in Boston, inheriting many of the beautiful working antique presses. Gradually the gallery morphed into Impressions Gallery and settled on the corner of Newbury and Dartmouth Streets. Under the lead of Victoria Munroe, the gallery flourished, focusing on drawings and prints. He was never happier than he was then, immersed in this vibrant world of art and artists, exhibitions and openings.

Always busy, his project list included a bamboo cage for the two woolly monkey babies he rescued, stone patios, one edged with channeled pools that funneled water to a pool where from a circulating pump moved water back around, specimen trees planted, a carriage road for Mom in Maine, stairs to beach and a setup to cook the lobsters down on the rocks. a fort for me with raisable gangplank and a sailfish in the basement of Wellesley house. A non-stop tinkerer he made reflecting paintings on plexiglass, submerged copper in the ocean for patination, made personal time capsules and wood sculptures. In our childhood he devised shingle pickup projects, simple jewelry making for Mom’s xmas presents and superb scavenger hunts. Leaving the land of lakes, he fell in love with sailing and then with being out on the ocean. Never a technical sailor, we once completed the Chowder Race backwards. He warmed and beamed when out sailing. With a hinged mast on the catboat he could explore those narrow tidal rivers. Often turning involved a dinghy assist. Although sometimes the sailing was wild and sometimes interrupted by the unexpected sandbar or an unseen lobster pot, he always made it fun. Not one to stay put, his travelling and exploring were extensive. Far-flung destinations, India in his mid-eighties, NYC as often as possible in his later eighties were equally loved as exploring Maine islands, Buzzards Bay or just going out rowing locally.

As their world grew smaller, they relished this elephant of a house he had fallen in love with six decades earlier. Rocks enthralled him. He loved MOMA’s “flower stones” and made innumerable iterations. Walking on the beach, looking and collecting, were favorite activities. His sense of humor never flagged. Knock knock jokes, woolly dog stories were tops. Palindromes he loved. Stone deaf in his nineties, he began a series of memoirs. Writing in pencil on a legal pad on the walnut table he’d made as a young man, he wrote, word-processed, printed and distributed them by the chapter. A social creature, in his deafness he connected by writing about his life and sharing stories. Later he focused on letter writing with an almost instantaneous turnaround. Open, read, write, mail. He became an avid movie watcher: the Roosevelts, Alec Guinness, James Bond and Silent Movie were mainstays.

A memorial service will be held November 14, 2015 at 11 am in the Cohasset Unitarian Church. Donations in his memory may made to WGBH or to AFSC

 Service Information