Richard Connor, 80, of Vero Beach, passed away peacefully on Dec. 1, 2014, after a short but courageous battle with cancer.
He is survived by his two former wives; children Michael David of Baltimore, Md., Colleen Jo of Oakland, Calif., and Shawn Patrick from Burlington, Wisc.; and his brother Wayne and his family.
Connor was born on Sept. 29, 1934, in Nashua, N.H., the first of two sons born to the late William J. (Luke) and Grace E. Connor. He grew up in downtown Nashua with his parents and younger brother Wayne.
While attending Nashua High School, he excelled and lettered in three sports and played football and baseball for the well-known Charles (Buzz) Harvey. While in high school, he was also elected to the New Hampshire All State football team like another well-known Nashua High School graduate and MLB all-star “Birdie” Tebbetts. Harvey and Tebbetts remained his heroes throughout his life.
After graduating from high school he attended New England College (NEC) in Henniker, N.H. where he starred in soccer and lacrosse. He liked to point out that while at NEC he played Syracuse’s Jim Brown in lacrosse long before Brown’s distinguished Hall-of-Fame National Football League (NFL) career.
At NEC, he also met his wife-to-be, Kathleen Hazel French and they moved to Connecticut upon graduation from NEC ending up in Winsted, and then Colebrook, Conn. They married on June 23, 1956, and had three children, all still living.
After living in Colebrook for 23 years, Connor moved with his wife Kay to Kihei (Maui), Hawaii in 1981 and remained there until 1983, when they separated. He moved back to Northwest Connecticut and settled in Winsted, then Barkhamsted. He married the former Linda M. LePine in July 1988 and helped raise her two daughters, Shelly and Rebecca before they divorced in 2005.
Known as a stern but compassionate father and husband, he helped raise his three children and two step-daughters in a disciplined manner which helped them all to go to top-rated U.S. colleges and prosper thereafter. His mantra to his children was always to “study hard and have fun.”
He worked for more than 40 years as a Middle School and High School math and geography teacher in Northwest Connecticut before his final retirement in 1996. To his co-workers, friends, and family he was always known for his wry sense of humor and wit. He often liked to remind people that he was still in the “twilight of a mediocre career.” As another example of his humor, his parting words and noted life accomplishments was “that I made a tie rack in the seventh grade!”
Lastly, he was an avid reader and writer. In addition to his family, Connor also loved animals, domesticated and wild, and continuously supported many charities throughout his life that sought to protect them.
Memorial contributions may be made in his name to the following charities: The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), 2100 L Street, NW Washington, DC 20037; or the World Wildlife Federation World Wildlife Fund, 1250 24th Street, NW P.O. Box 97180, Washington, DC 20090.
