Rowland Frazee

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Rowland Cardwell Frazee, C.C. (12 May 1921 – July 29, 2007^[1]) was a Canadian banker and former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Royal Bank of Canada from 1979 to 1986.

Born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, at age five, the family moved to St. Stephen, New Brunswick where his father had been appointed bank manager. At age eighteen, Rowland Frazee went to work as a clerk at his father's branch but following the outbreak of World War II he enlisted in the Canadian Army in 1941 serving overseas with the Carlton and York Regiment, First Canadian Infantry Division. Wounded on three separate occasions, at the time of his decommissioning in 1945 he held the rank of major.

After the war Frazee studied at Dalhousie University in Halifax where he graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce degree in 1948. Resuming his banking career, he rose to become the Royal Bank's president in 1977 and retired as Chairman in 1986.

In 1985, he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada and was promoted to Companion in 1991. In 2001, he was inducted into the New Brunswick Business Hall of Fame.

He was the father of Stephen Frazee, a Toronto real estate broker and Catherine Frazee, former chair of the Ontario Human Rights Commission. He was the grandfather of Patrick Frazee and Laura Frazee, who recently graduated from Dalhousie University in May 2008.