[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 206 (Thursday, December 19, 2019)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1630]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    HONORING THE LIFE OF FRED MAYER

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. JARED HUFFMAN

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                      Thursday, December 19, 2019

  Mr. HUFFMAN. Madam Speaker, I rise today in memory of Fred Mayer, who 
passed away on December 10, 2019, at the age of 86 after a lifetime of 
exemplary public service to his community.
  Fred Mayer was born in Kansas City to Anna Landie Mayer and 
Maximillian Philip Mayer. His father died when he was just six months 
old and his mother reluctantly placed Fred and his older sister in 
Jewish orphanages in Kansas City and Denver while trying to secure 
employment to support the family. Mr. Mayer would later credit his time 
in the Jewish orphanages with helping to develop his great sense of 
justice. He would go on to champion causes that served the greater 
community and would always put others above himself. When he was eight, 
the family reunited and moved to San Francisco. At the age of 12, Mr. 
Mayer started working at local pharmacies and later went on to graduate 
from Lowell High School, the University of California, Berkeley, and in 
1954, the pharmacy school at University of California San Francisco. 
After graduating with his pharmacy degree, Mr. Mayer served in the 
United States Army where he ran a mobile surgical unit in Germany.
  Following his service in the Army, Mr. Mayer met and married 
Jacqueline Levy Mayer in 1958, and a year later, they settled in San 
Rafael, CA. In 1963, Mr. Mayer bought Sausalito Pharmacy and operated 
it for 33 years. Mr. Mayer used his pharmacy as a place to educate the 
community on various public health issues including the dangers of 
smoking and the need for safe sex education. In the 1970s, Mr. Mayer 
started a methadone program from within the pharmacy, and after a close 
friend of his died of cancer, the pharmacy became one of the first 
drugstores in the nation to stop the sale of tobacco. In 1974, Mr. 
Mayer went back to school at the University of California, Berkeley, to 
obtain a master's degree. Soon after, he founded a non-profit 
organization, Pharmacy Planning Service Inc., where he continued to 
deliver much needed community education on public health.
  Known to all around him as larger-than-life, Mr. Mayer worked well 
into his later years. Most recently, he worked to educate medical 
cannabis users about interactions with other medications that might be 
harmful. He was also well known for his Great American Smokeout 
campaigns, bolstering National Condom Week, and his crusade to put 
child safety caps on prescription medications.
  Mr. Mayer was a well-respected community leader who will be 
remembered for his dominant spirit and commitment to public service. He 
is survived by his daughter Heidi and his sons David and Charles. While 
he will be greatly missed, Mr. Mayer's legacy will live on through the 
indelible positive impact he had on his many friends and family and the 
community at large.

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