In Memory

Richard A Martin

Richard A Martin



 
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04/22/17 05:39 PM #1    

Priscilla Coit (Murphy)

I admired and enjoyed Richard, for his intellect, wit, dry humility, and charming insights.  I was so proud to see his achievements, and so sorry to see how early we'd lost him. 


04/23/17 08:37 AM #2    

Mark Sherkow

Richard Martin and I wrote each other after college, and I had dinner with him once when I was in New York City.  I also heard him at the Chicago Art Institute give a lecture on design in the West Village and had lunch with him after the lecture. I miss him.

 


04/30/17 09:52 PM #3    

Jeffrey C Freedman

Richard and I were neighbors, I knew him starting in third grade.  He lived on the same street as I did in Merion, about three houses down, and we occasionally played together and went to the same public elementary school.  At some point, I recall he went to a private school, whereas I continued in public schools.  Then we both ended up at Swarthmore, where we were only casual friends. I was saddened by his early demise. 


05/19/17 04:43 PM #4    

Ronald D Hurt

Richard ("Dickles") and I were roommates (with five others: Jack White, Tony Kitzinger, Marshall Beil, Howie Brown, and Ted Redmond!) in Mary Lyons 3 freshman year, and then he and I shared a double sophomore year in MaryLyons 4.  

Richard was erudite, precise, hysterically funny, loving, and haughty, and we were close, close friends.  As I recall, he won that year's "Library Prize," awarded to the student with the best private library on campus.  Given my ignorance and complete lack of sophistication, I couldn't even imagine what a private libary might mean, let alone how to create a prize-winning one!  It's hard to imagine two people more different than Richard and I, but we cared about and enjoyed each other enormously. 

We drifted apart after I left Swarthmore at the end of my junior year, taking two years off.  By the time I returned, my classmates had mostly graduated, including Richard.

Thankfully, I worked in New York for a while, as did Richard, and we ran into each other from time to time, sometimes on purpose, sometimes accidentially.  You may know that he ended his career as the head of the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum.  The Costume Institute is world renowned, and the legacy of Richard's work there is widely respected and admired.  Following his death, I had lunch with his predecessor, and friend, Harold Koda, and we had a great time sharing memories of Richard.  He died far too young, but he still had an extraordinary impact on his chosen field, art history.


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