Lawrence was predeceased by his father, Ronald Victor Saxton, mother, Violet Lawrence, brothers James (Jim), Robert (Bob), and Stanley (Stan).
He is lovingly remembered by his brother Donald (Don) and his many nieces and nephews.
Lawrence received the B.Math., the M.Math., and the Ph.D. degrees from the University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ON, Canada, in 1969, 1970, and 1973, respectively. After graduating, he was employed in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Regina, Regina until his retirement on June 30, 2011.
He was Department Head from 1994 to 1999 and Assistant Dean (Undergraduate) for the Faculty of Science from 2005 to 2007. He worked as a Visiting Associate Professor at Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, U.S.A., during 1982-1983, as a Visiting Research Scientist at Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, U.S.A., during 1990-1991 and as a Visiting Professor at the University of Waterloo, during 1999-2000.
His research interests were in the areas of Database Theory and the Theory of Computing, studying the requirements for the next generation of database systems. In particular, he worked on including limited order information in a database system without increasing the complexity of the resultant queries. Order such as that available in lists provides a useful modelling tool for areas such as the web and scientific data analysis.
Lawrence published articles in Theory of Computing Systems, Journal of Computer and System Sciences, Journal of Computing and Information, IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering, Information Processing and Management, ACM SIGMOD Record, Information Processing Letters, INFOR, and Congressus Numerantium.
In addition to his research, Lawrence was an enthusiastic and popular teacher. He used his own work experience to convey to students how the rather dry aspects of systems analysis were essential to successful systems development. He was also a great story teller and shared his stories with his classes. An avid supporter of the Saskatchewan Roughriders he rarely missed a game or a chance to comment as we all do on the team’s performance.
A private service for Larry was held in the Legends Room at Memorial Gardens, Regina, Saskatchewan on Friday, October 28, 2022 at 1:30 p.m. The service was livestreamed with the link that is posted below.
In lieu of flowers, donations to Kidsport Saskatchewan and the Kinsmen Telemiracle Foundation are welcomed.
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