Walter Evich

Evich, Walter of Wyandotte. August 3, 2013. Age 86. Born in Wyandotte, Michigan on June 5, 1927. Preceded in death by parents Anthony and Mary Elaine Evich, sister Marie Kovacs, brother Anthony Evich, niece Antoinette Evich Varga, and grandson Joseph Gabriel Engebretsen. Survived by wife Mary Jane Evich and eight children; Donald (Gwen) Evich, Carol (Greg) Krol, Robert (Karen) Evich, Sandra Slagle, Richard Evich, Michael (Michele) Evich, Mary Beth (Doug) Engebretsen and David (Jennifer) Evich, twenty-eight grandchildren, five great-grandchildren, and many nieces and nephews. He graduated in January 1945 from Theodore Roosevelt High School, where he excelled in music and served as a drum major. In 1996, he was honored as a RHS Distinguished Graduate. Walter served in the U.S. Navy as a medical corpsman during WWII. He earned masters degrees in both violin and viola from University of Michigan, where he served as a concertmaster, won the University's concerto competition on viola, and received the Oliver Ditson Award in 1951. Walter joined the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in 1952, performing as a violist until retiring in 1998. He was active locally as a violin/viola teacher and several of his students went on to pursue careers in music. In 1979, he organized and conducted the Downriver Youth Symphony. A self-taught civil engineer, Walter worked on major construction projects such as Ford Motor Company, Metro Airport, Ford Auditorium, and Enrico Fermi I, to support his growing family. An avid swimmer, Walter competed in Downriver Senior Olympics between 1989-2010 and garnered an impressive tally of gold and silver medals. Extraordinarily inventive, he applied his creative talents to numerous projects. He authored a Universal Civil Calendar, now on file at the United Nations, the Vatican, and the World Council of Churches. It addressed many of the quirks of our present-day calendar with its uneven months and leap-years. In 1990, Walter won an honorable mention in the International Furth Ruble Prize Competition for his idea of how to convert the Russian ruble into hard western currency. He also loved simple projects like making unique scratch pads for friends and family and he inherited a love for gardening from his Hungarian-immigrant parents.

Walter Evich

June 5, 1927 - August 3, 2013