Larry Ray Nyhoff, 85, passed peacefully into glory on Wednesday, November 13, 2024.

Larry was born on November 29, 1938, in Dispatch, Kansas, the youngest of the five children, all boys, of Sarah (Ramaker) and George Nyhoff. As a child, he lived in a home in Dispatch, Kansas, at the junction of two country roads where there stood the church the family attended, the hardware store run by his father, the grocery store run by his brother, and a couple of other neighboring family homes. Larry attended a one-room schoolhouse on the prairie throughout his school years and often could be found helping his father at the hardware store when not in class. The family later moved to Downs, Kansas, a nearby city with just over a thousand residents. At Downs High School, he participated in most sports, and was also a strong student, to which he always credited the assistance of his mother, a former school teacher.

Larry earned a scholarship at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where he enrolled in 1956, majoring in Mathematics. On weekends, Larry liked to travel to the home of his older brother Vern, who lived in Muskegon with his wife and their four young children, for whom neighbor Sharlene Vanderstelt often served as a babysitter. Larry and Sharlene began dating, and, after Larry graduated from Calvin, they wedded on September 3, 1960.

Soon afterward, they moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan, where Larry began graduate studies in mathematics at the University of Michigan. After earning his master's degree, Larry accepted an offer to return to Calvin in 1963 as a faculty member in mathematics. In his first decade at Calvin, Larry not only grew to become an excellent mathematics teacher, but he also returned to graduate studies, now at Michigan State University, where he earned his doctorate in 1969. During this time, Larry and Sharlene also began a family, bringing their four children into the world.

By the end of the 1970s, Larry had shifted academic directions at Calvin, inaugurating a program of study in a brand new field that had emerged in higher education: Computer Science. Over the next two decades, not only did Larry develop into a highly regarded professor of computer science at Calvin, but, drawing from his strong teaching, he also authored and co-authored a series of successful and widely respected computer programming textbooks that were published and used at colleges and universities around the world. Larry remained on the faculty at Calvin for 41 years. Always a strongly dedicated but truly humble teacher, Larry received the Exemplary Teaching Award in 2002, Calvin's highest faculty honor. He retired from full-time teaching in 2004, but he continued teaching computer science part-time at Calvin and also continued updating his textbooks to new editions. Decades of Calvin graduates credit him for decisively shaping their studies and their subsequent careers. He truly and deeply loved Calvin College, and he consistently approached his teaching as a vocation to which God had called him.

Although Larry spent almost all of his adult life in Michigan, Larry maintained a lifelong love of his Kansas homeland, frequently sprinkling references to it into his course materials and textbooks. He took his family frequently to visit Kansas and helped them discover the simple, small-town treasures that he was surrounded by in his youth.

Larry was a dedicated and loving husband and father. Larry and Sharlene were married for 64 years. From the earliest years of this marriage, they were faithful members of Shawnee Park Christian Reformed Church. Larry and Sharlene were also perennially avid fans of the Calvin Knights basketball team and the Detroit Tigers. While he was a busy professor, he also loved doing yard work, and other outdoor "chores". He enjoyed spending summers camping at Grand Haven State Park and family spring break trips to Florida. He spent many hours helping each of his four children with their school work, even occasionally assisting them after they enrolled as students at Calvin. As grandchildren arrived, he relished his new role of "Grandpa," lovingly creating individualized playful ways of interacting with each one of them.

Larry is preceded in death by his parents George and Sarah (Ramaker) brothers Ivan (Clara), Lloyd (Nelvina), Vernon (Betty). Larry is survived by his wife Sharlene and their four children: Jeff (Kelly) Nyhoff, Jim Nyhoff, Julie (Greg) Cole, and Joni (Tom) VandenBosch. Larry and Sharlene have fourteen grandchildren: Rebecca Quinn, Megan Hicks, SaraKate Langejans, Josh, Derek, and Izzie Cole, Abigail, Micah, Lucas, Gabriel, Eden, Josiah, Noah, and Sarena VandenBosch.

A visitation for Larry will take place Tuesday, December 17, from 5-8 pm and Wednesday, December 18, from 10-11 am at Shawnee Park CRC, 2255 Tecumseh Dr SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49506. The celebration of life service will be held on Wednesday, December 18, at 11 am at Shawnee Park CRC. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be given towards the Larry and Sharlene Nyhoff Scholarship in Computer Science at Calvin University.