Heinz K. Meier, leading authority on nineteenth- and twentieth-century U.S. Swiss relations and Louis I. Jaffe Professor of History at Old Dominion University, died December 12, 1989 at the age of sixty. Born in Zürich, Switzerland on October 13, 1929 Meier studied at European institutions and later earned his doctorate from Emory University in 1959. Professor Meier was a naturalized U.S. citizen. During his distinguished career at Old Dominion University, which included service as Chair, Department of History (1973–75) and Dean, School of Arts and Letters (1975–85), he contributed appreciably to the development and expansion of the international mission of the university. He also served the community as president of the World Affairs Council of Greater Hampton Roads and president of the Norfolk Theater Center.

Professor Meier wrote several books including Friendship Under Stress: U.S. Swiss Relations, 1900–1950 and The United States and Switzerland in the Nineteenth Century, and published internationally in numerous learned journals. He was a member of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations, the American Historical Association, the Southern Historical Association, and the Swiss-American History Society, while also serving as editor of the society's Newsletter, 1970–86.

At the time of his death, Professor Meier and his wife, Regula, a German language professor, were writing a bibliography of Switzerland. In addition to his wife, he is survived by four children and two grandchildren.

Carl Boyd
Patrick J. Rollins
Old Dominion University