I just learned this. Richard gave me my first hours’ instruction at Franklin-Hart airport 18A in northeast Georgia.
I first got to know him when he listed his and his dad’s Navion for sale on Facebook in 2019. That fell through, but I found another one in Richard’s home airport on Northeast Georgia. He flew a Cessna 180 down from Fredericksburg, Maryland to 18A to meet me and give me my Navion checkout.
We could not get the left main gear to lock up, and after circling the area for almost an hour, we landed, put the Navion up on jacks, and Richard, his dad, Dick (over 4,000 hours in Navions), his brother, Cliff (also lots of Navion hours and flies 747s for UPS), the seller (flew A-4 Skyhawks off the Oriskany in Vietnam), and an A&P were all underneath the Navion trying to troubleshoot the problem. I was in the cockpit pumping the manual hydraulic pump when ordered. We took another post Mx flight and it still wasn’t working.
I didn’t complete that sale. However, I have Richard’s signature in my logbook.
Since then, whenever I met him at Sun n Fun or AirVenture, he greeted me and treated me like an old friend.
A kinder, gentler man probably doesn’t exist.
Blue skies and tailwinds, Richard.