Kennard Underwood Jr. ’38

Kennard "Bud" Underwood suffered a massive heart attack Oct. 14, 1997, and died at the Pardee Hospital in Flat Rock, N.C. A longtime resident of Fairfax, Va., he and his wife, Nancy, had moved to Flat Rock just a few years before his death.

Bud came to us from the Taft School and Rensselaer Polytechnic. During WWII, he was in the Army Air Force, flying more than 55 missions in B-24s.

Most of his business career was spent traveling for the Tyrex Division of General Motors, for whom, as their top sales executive, he applied his expertise in industrial equipment and earth-moving machinery to legendary effect. He retired in 1989.

The class will remember Bud most fondly for being the happy face behind the drums in our 8-Ball Jazz Band. The 8-Balls were an immensely popular Reunions feature for over 30 years, and Bud never missed a single Reunions gig in all that time. A longtime Dixieland jazz enthusiast, he enjoyed playing for groups such as the popular Washington Monumentals in Washington, D.C., combos in Venice, Fla., where he wintered, and many other gatherings of business executives who loved to get together after work to play jazz.

Bud is survived by Nancy, his son, Peter, daughter Patricia, sister Rosamond Wilson, and two grandchildren. Like them, we are all going to miss his enthusiasm and, most of all, his smiling face.

The Class of 1938