Dick died in a helicopter crash in March 2000 while vacationing in New Zealand.  His wife of 43 years, Chanetta also died in the accident. They had lived much of their married lives in California, spending 20 years in Woodland Hills before finally settling in Danville. 

Dick entered USNA from Cairo, IL after a year at Miami University.  He left USNA during first class year in December 1955.  He once wrote that he counted his “closest friends being from the halls of Bancroft”.

Dick continued his education at the University of Illinois at Urbana graduating with a BSEE in 1957.  His initial employment was with Douglas Aircraft installing Thor missile sites in England.  Subsequently, he joined Litton Industries, taking his family to Germany as Director of European Product Support for the F-104 Inertial Navigation System.  In 1969, Dick started his own company, Satellite Positioning Corporation, which he sold three years later.  He returned to Litton in 1975 rising to the position of Director of Marketing for Land Warfare Systems.  Continuing his career in the sensor and systems industry, he became President of Systron Donner, a British electronics firm from which he retired in 1996.

Though retired, Dick continued consulting to the industries he had been serving until the time of his death.  Dick and Chanetta were very active in community and church activities, where Dick was a guiding leader and donor to events for those less fortunate.  They were survived by three sons, Rick, Britton, and Hollis and six grandchildren.