| March 25, 1892 |
Born in Buxton, North Dakota, to Charles and Anne (Belanger) Fritz. |
| Fall 1898 |
Fritz family moves to Fargo, North Dakota, for better employment prospects.
|
| 1898-1905 |
Chester Fritz attends school in Fargo. |
| 1902 |
Charles Fritz is permanently disabled in a threshing accident. |
| February 1905 |
Anne Fritz leaves the family, never to be heard from again. |
| March 1905 |
Chester Fritz moves to Lidgerwood, North Dakota, to live with his maternal
aunt Kathrine (Belanger) and her husband Neil C. Macdonald. |
| June 1908 |
Graduates as valedictorian from Lidgerwood High School. |
| 1908-1910 |
Attends University of North Dakota. |
| Summer 1909 |
Works in Billings, MT, at the Grant Hotel. |
| 1911-1914 |
Attends the University of Washington; graduates with a B.A. in Economics.
|
| 1914 |
Employed by Fisher Flouring Mills in Seattle. The next year he is
dispatched as an export agent in Hong Kong. |
| February 1917 |
Embarks on a six-month personal tour of inland China. |
| August 1917-1921 |
Works as junior partner to Charles Richardson, a metals trader based out of
Hong Kong. |
| Summer 1921 |
Accepts a position with American Metal Company as their representative in
China, trading in precious metals, primarily silver bullion; he moves to
Shanghai. |
| January 30, 1927 |
Wins the Shanghai Paper Hunt Club Hunt Handicap, the first of 22 such
events in which he would win or place. Besides traveling, he enjoyed polo and
was a highly rated player. |
| January 1, 1929 |
Joins the investment firm of Swan, Culbertson & Fritz, which traded in
New York stocks and bonds and Chinese government bonds. |
| June 18, 1929 |
Marries Bernadine Szold in Manchuria. She moves to Shanghai with him. |
| 1937 |
Japanese invade China, but Swan, Culbertson & Fritz stay in business
until 1941. |
| August 1942 |
Placed in a Japanese internment camp in Chaipei, China. |
| 1943 |
Repatriated; arrives in New York City in December. |
| 1946 |
Returns to China to deal in gold bullion on international markets. |
| September 1946 |
Divorces Bernadine; they had been separated since 1944. |
| Spring 1947 |
Moves from Shanghai to Hong Kong to deal in metal trading to India. |
| 1950-1953 |
Leaves China for good; moves to New York and travels restlessly for three
years. |
| November 1950 |
Attends a UND alumni dinner in New York City; within a month, sends a
$10,000 donation to the UND Development Fund. |
| 1950-1977 |
Fritz donates more than $2.25 million to UND to finance the Chester Fritz
Scholarship Fund (1956), the Chester Fritz Library (1958), the Chester Fritz
Auditorium (1965) and the Kathrine B. Tiffany Scholarship Fund (1969). He also
donates over $1 million to the University of Washington (1957-1973); $40,000 to
Lidgerwood School District (1971); and $50,000 to the Adirondack Museum in
upstate New York (1977). |
| June 1951 |
Returns to UND to accept an honorary Doctor of Laws degree. |
| 1953 |
Moves to Rome with plans to retire, but continues working as a private
investor and speculator for the rest of his life. |
| March 21, 1954 |
Marries Vera Kachalina Baylin, a Moscow-born world traveler, in Zurich.
|
| 1958-1959 |
Chester and Vera Fritz move to Gstaad, Switzerland, and construct Chalet
Vera. |
| October 1961 |
Returns to UND for the dedication of the Chester Fritz Library. |
| 1972 |
Fritz and Vera move to Monte Carlo, Monaco, and live there as well as
Lausanne, Switzerland. |
| 1977 |
Sells Chalet Vera in Switzerland. |
| 1981 |
The Journal of Chester Fritz: Travels Through Western China in 1917
is published |
| 1982 |
Ever Westward to the Far East: The Story of Chester Fritz by Chester
Fritz and Dan Rylance is published. |
| July 28, 1983 |
Dies at the age of 91. He is interred in Memorial Park Cemetery, Grand
Forks. |
| November 2, 2005 |
Vera Fritz dies in Monaco. |