Statement from Dr. Joseph J. McGowan, president of Bellarmine University:
It is my sad duty to report the death of Dr. Bernard Francis Thiemann, ’62, who taught more than 5,500 students in business administration and finance during his 31-year tenure at Bellarmine University and, while doing so, became one of the most beloved professors in school history.
He was 70.
Dr. Thiemann
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Dr. Thiemann (Bernie) was a 1958 graduate of St. Xavier High School, and was Student Council President at Bellarmine in 1962, the year he graduated with a degree in accounting, earning the Lenihan Leadership Award. He received his MBA from Indiana University in 1963 and his law degree from the University of Louisville in 1971.
At Bellarmine, he was Teacher of the Year in 1977, won the Monsignor Alfred F. Horrigan Distinguished Service Award in 1992 and was named both the Bellarmine Alumni Association’s Alumnus of the Year and the Accounting Alumnus of the Year in 1997. He became Professor Emeritus in 1999 for distinguished service. In 2003, the Bernard F. Thiemann Endowed Grant was established.
Dr. Thiemann served on the Alumni Board of Directors, the Bellarmine Board of Trustees, and on numerous committees including the Rank and Tenure Committee.
He was a member of the Kentucky Bar Association, the American Finance Association, and the St. Joseph Catholic Orphan Society. He served in the U.S. Coast Guard Reserve from 1963-1974.
Bernie was a loved and loving member of our campus community who contributed much to our university as a student, as a professor, as a colleague and as a friend. He will be missed.
Bernie’s family and friends will celebrate his life at a memorial mass at
Holy Trinity Catholic Church, 501 Cherrywood Road, 40207 on Friday, September 23 at 10 a. m. Visitation will precede the mass at 8:30 a.m. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made to the Bernard F. Thiemann Endowed Scholarship Fund at Bellarmine University.