FERENC "FRANK" HASENFRATZ

FERENC HASENFRATZ (FRANK) Died January 8, 2022 From those many of us who miss him and want him remembered now that the initial period of grief and recollections is passed. An extraordinary person whose humility in the presence of hugely impressive achievements was outstanding, and a lesson from which many could benefit. We recall his early life when Hungarians of German origin (that the Hasenfratz's were considered notwithstanding their long history in Hungary) had their houses confiscated to accommodate 'real' Hungarians, those returning after WW2 to a country they had disowned. On short notice the family was required to empty the contents of their home into a cart that Frank and his family pushed up the hills to an infested house in a previously abandoned village to which they, and others from Szár, had been banished.His 1956 escape on foot from yet another Russian invasion led him eventually, and to our great good fortune, to Canada where he inventively started, with the essential contribution from his wife and business partner, Margaret, to machine metal parts on a lathe powered by a motor from the home's washing machine. That was followed by a transformative move – a one- man shop in his garage.To remain regrettably brief, that led to his creation of Linamar (Linda, Nancy and Margaret) that innovatively established machining factories in Guelph limiting the number of people to ~150 challenging the strikingly obvious inefficiency of thousand- worker facilities. The company raised its first public capital in 1984 when revenues from the, then, three factories was around $35 million. Fifteen years later - $1 billion. The rest of this astonishing story is for Linda to tell! Everything about Frank, his clarity of thought, the relationships he founded (and, exceptionally, retained), his monumental business achievements whilst remaining never once boastful, his tight family, remains a model for all of us and certainly for all of our society. He is missed but will be long remembered. David Allan and Cynthia Young