Rick was our first child and the first grandson on both sides.
As a young boy, Rick belonged to Cub Scouts and won his
first car race in the Pinewood Derby! Guess that got him started.
We lived on a farm and by age 10, Rick was driving his granpa's
tractors with disks. He has alway wanted to drive anything with
motors and know how and why they worked. He liked marching
songs and occasionally in the evenings, he would like to stay up
past his bedtime alone, listen to the records and march quietly for
awhile......

In high school, Rick lettered in football and track. He broke the
school record in 180 yard low hurdles and won first place in the 440's.
He was awarded the degree of Green Hand in 1970 for FFA. He worked
in logging for a few years when he was younger and the last twenty
years, he worked as a heavy equipment operator.

As a member of the Sublimity Harvest Festival, Rick was very
involved and was always very excited with many ideas for helping
the races. One of his biggest enjoyments and probably frustrations,
at times, was working on his 1977 Chev Country Modified Pickup
for the Tractor Pull Races throughout Oregon. His favorite, though,
were the tractor pull races in September each year at the Harvest
Festival in Sublimity. He won the Rookie of the year Award in 1997
and won the Boedigheimer Award in 1998 for his contributions and
time given to the Sublimity Harvest Festival. He was active with Nascar
Stock Car Racing on the pit crew with Gericke Racing and Performance
Engines in Portland. He also enjoyed hot rods, hunting, water skiing
pro wrestling and hunting.

Rick was a loving, giving, gruff and kind man with a big heart.
When we first moved to Dallas, Rick and his family lived here at
the time, our youngest son Jeff was 13 and wanted to play summer
baseball, as he did each year. We arrived too late for sign ups, so Rick
said he and his friend would coach a team, if we could find enough
boys to form a team. We did! The coaches, Rick and Eric and the
boys worked hard. They did not win a lot of games, but they did
have fun.......He was a loving companion to Sue for 10 years. A
loving father to his two sons, Nate and Josh and a loving son to his
parents, Pat and Les. He left behind Sue, his two sons, his parents,
two grandmothers Dessie and Mildred, three brothers, four sisters,
many aunts, uncles, cousins and many friends.

Preceding him in death were his father Richard, sister Tricia,
and nephew Daniel. He loved all his family and his family loves
and misses Rick so very much...........