DR. BRYN FRANCIS GREER-WOOTTEN

Bryn Greer-Wootten, born in West Ham, London, UK, on February 13, 1938, passed away in his 87th year, in Toronto, on August 5, 2025. Bryn was predeceased by his partner, Mirka (Miroslava, 1944 – 2025); and his son, Stephen (1964 – 2018). He is survived by his sisters: Gillian, (1939), (Peter) Stevens; Annemarie, (1941), (Peter) Woodward; Mary Jacqueline, (1943), (Roger) Munn; Glynis Rose, (1949), (Tony) West; and brother, Paul Royston, (1945), (Maureen); as well as a number of nieces and nephews, who referred to him as "unc," and who will miss his presence during frequent sojourns in England and France to visit family. Bryn's rapport with his sisters is the stuff of family lore. They describe him providing leadership when he was as young as seven in the late stages of the Second World War. In particular, when Bryn, his mother, and sisters huddled in air raid centres while the family home was demolished by a doodlebug. Frequent trips back to London to help siblings and their children celebrate their success, especially when they marked scholastic achievements, continued after he moved to Canada. Education became a serious pursuit for Bryn when he entered Durham University in 1956 on a County Scholarship. In 1959, he enrolled in the Post-Graduate Institute of Education at the University of London. After two years of high school teaching in London and Montreal, he entered the PhD program in Geography and Planning at McGill University, graduating in 1968 with a focus on Urban and Quantitative Geography. In 1968, he moved from his position as an Assistant Professor of Geography at McGill to a similar position at the University of California, Berkeley. He returned to Canada with a position in Sociology at McGill. Bryn joined the geography department at York University in 1972. In 1983, he was promoted to Full Professor. Committed to interdisciplinary scholarship, he was cross appointed to the Faculty of Environmental Studies in 1994. Since his retirement in 2003, he has been a York Senior Scholar. In addition to his research and teaching at York, he held Visiting Professorships at Sir George Williams University in Montreal (1969–70), the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (Zurich, 1971), the University of Ottawa (1972), Université de Lausanne (Suisse, 1978), and at several Atkinson College (York) Summer Schools (1972; 1982–83; 1984–87). Since 2002, much of Dr. Greer-Wootten's work has been with colleagues and students at the Department of Environmental Geography, Institute of Geonics, Czech Academy of Sciences, in Brno, Czech Republic. After appointment as a Visiting Scientist in 2002, he was a member of the Editorial Board of Moravian Geographical Reports (MGR) from 2003–2009, and in 2009, he became the Editor-in-Chief. The Czech Academy of Sciences recognised his valuable contributions with the prestigious Karel Engliš Honorary Medal for Merit in the Social and Economic Sciences in 2018. Bryn was a Research Associate in York University's Institute for Behavioural Research (later the Institute for Social Research, ISR) from 1972 to 1974 and served as Acting Director of the Survey Research Centre until 1978, returning to ISR in 1987–88 as a Research Fellow. He returned to ISR in 2002 as an Associate Consultant in the Statistical Consulting Service (SCS), continuing as a Coordinator from 2003 onwards. During his long and productive career, Bryn was steadfast about critiquing academic dogma. His MA research documenting the decline of the Darent Valley in Kent questioned the notion of a region at a time when regional geography was ascendant. Moving from quantitative to qualitative and humanistic geography, he welcomed students who were enthralled with questions of ontology and epistemology. With the policy turn in human geography, he turned his attention to recycling and energy conservation, especially the potential and perils of nuclear energy. Much of his research in Czechia drew on these interests, examining the environmental sustainability of energy resources in an era of climate change. Dr. Greer-Wootten's ceaseless commitment to his students and their success was legendary. In addition to teaching a graduate course in research design to almost every human geography graduate student who entered the program in the 1980s and 1990s, he was always available to students for conversations about almost any topic, research-related or not. Long after his retirement, he participated without fail in the weekly Geography colloquium. His questions for distinguished visitors, colleagues, and students invariably led to conversations about the very foundations of the research. At ISR and as a consultant and coordinator at the Statistical Consulting Service, he helped hundreds of researchers figure out how to answer their research questions. No doubt Bryn's final wish would be that his former students commit to helping the next generation of scholars. Bryn's partner of the last 25 years, Mirka Ondrack, died two months before Bryn. Bryn and Mirka travelled widely together and enjoyed opera at home and abroad. Their home was a meeting place for friends and colleagues over the years. As per Bryn's wishes, his remains have been cremated and there will be no funeral services. Bryn's and Mirka's ashes will be interred in the Czeck republic. Those who wish can donate to their local food bank.