Richard died March 11, 2016. He was born in India, but his father, a major with the British Royal Horse Artillery, died when Richard was 6, and he moved to America, where he grew up in South Carolina and California. After a year at Duke, Richard came to Princeton on a Navy ROTC scholarship. He was a member of Dial Lodge and majored in aeronautical engineering. He flew jets for the Navy after graduation until an attack of polio sent him to Warm Springs, Ga., for rehabilitation.
After earning a master’s degree from MIT, he worked on the NASA Ranger 4 and re-entry spacecraft. He got an MBA from Harvard and moved into executive positions dealing with aerospace and marine products. He became the president and CEO of ITT Decca and Raytheon divisions and eventually transitioned into his own consulting business for senior executives.
Richard owned small planes and large boats and three times took an entire year off from work to cruise the Bahamas with his family or be an island bush pilot. The polio reasserted itself eventually, and by 2004, Richard had to give up his plane and accept increasing limits on his activity.
He is survived by his wife, Jamie; five children; and 14 grandchildren.