Andy Fife was “a resident and dear friend to many in West Seattle,” as Art Cuellar explains, in asking us to share Andy’s obituary and word of a wake planned next weekend:
Andrew “Andy” Fife, aged 56, passed away in West Seattle on February 23, surrounded by a group of his close friends.
Andy, a proud Englishman, was well known in West Seattle for his great physical fitness and love of hiking in the mountains. What was probably not so well known was the fascinating life Andrew had led prior to this. He was born in Tripoli, Libya, in 1954, where his English father worked in the oil industry. His mother, Bozena, had escaped from Poland during WWII and met her future husband during this journey. Andrew attended boarding school in England and said that he loved to watch the Harry Potter films as they so reminded him of school.
In his 20’s Andy came to the States to attend commercial pilot training. He earned his wings and went on to fly commercial aircraft for a variety of different airlines. After the airline industry went through a rough spot in the 80’s he turned his mind to physical training and spent time in both the States and the UK working with athletes and rugby teams, to include the famed Leicester Tigers Rugby Team in England, a fact that he was exceedingly proud of. He also worked as an outdoor tour guide for a company called Trek America, taking groups of tourists to spectacular places all over America and Canada. This ultimately brought him to West Seattle, where he lived, worked and played for the next 15 years or so.
He was well known for spending vast amounts of his time at All Star Fitness, training the Seattle Rugby Club, hiking in the mountains and watching rugby at a variety of pubs around town. For the past several years he was busy working on developing a new piece of fitness equipment, the ThundrrBell, which he planned to have in every gym across the nation in the not too distant future. Andrew also had a special passion for the care of the wounded soldiers of the United States and Britain, and had visited the facilities in both countries where they were going through rehab. Andrew is survived by his mother, Bozena Fife, of Goring-on-Thames, England.
There will be a Wake held at the Beveridge Place Pub on Saturday, March 5 at 4:30 PM to celebrate Andrew’s life. Please come and share stories, have a beer and a laugh, because that is what Andy would want.
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