Richard “Dick” Roberts

Richard S Roberts, Jr (Dick), aged 89, passed away peacefully at his home in Glen Mills, PA on July 25, 2024. He was predeceased by the love of his life, Priscilla, by his parents and infant son Rhys.

A multi-lingual citizen of the world, Dick was born in Cleveland, OH in 1935 to Richard S Roberts and Dorothy Whaley Roberts and grew up in Wilmington, DE. While a student at Wilmington Friends School, he was chosen to participate in an international exchange program with the American Field Service the summer of 1952. Living with a family in Germany opened up the world to him and planted the seed of his love of travel. It was the first of many trips abroad. After getting his bachelor’s degree in Political and Economic Institutions from Yale in 1957, Dick was eager to return to Europe to further his education. He obtained a PhD in Political Science from the Graduate Institute of International Studies at the University of Geneva, Switzerland in 1962.

Dick had met Priscilla Herget on a student ship sailing to Europe in the summer of 1955. While he was at Yale, she was at the University of Montana. When he moved to Switzerland, she moved to Washington, DC. There were many miles between them, but through near-daily correspondence and an occasional visit, their hearts grew fonder. They were wed in 1959 at the Herget family home in Peoria, Illinois, then began married life together back in Geneva. Nearly 65 years of love and devotion to each other followed. They traveled the globe and brought up two world-wise daughters, settling in Egypt, El Salvador, California, Tunisia, Boston, Denver, and Morocco.

As an international management consultant, Dick spent his life and career promoting international understanding and bettering the lives of people in developing and underdeveloped countries.  His early work for the Ford Foundation took him from the Aswan Dam Project in Egypt to family planning projects in Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco. As an independent consultant for UN and US agencies, he organized many training seminars for public sector managers and development programs in most of West Africa, the Sudan, Haiti, Egypt, and Guatemala. Dick pursued his career with Boston-based Management Sciences for Health (MSH), often under contract with USAID, working on health care and family planning.  Short-term assignments took him to Algeria, Cameroun, Kenya, Senegal, Uganda, Zaire, and Zimbabwe. A long-term program focusing on maternal health began in Rwanda in 1991, but that came to a sudden end with a forced evacuation in 1994. Back in the United States, Dick continued traveling the world on short-term projects with MSH until his retirement, helping to improve management of and access to public health care in Africa, Honduras, Yemen, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, and the Philippines.

Traveling was not just part of his job, but was a passion that Dick shared with his entire family. He planned a memorable trip with his girls through West Africa one year, taking them as far as Timbuctoo using local modes of transport: train, boat, and bush taxi. He enjoyed skiing with his family in the Alps and sharing a raclette or fondue dinner along with a glass or two of good wine. His sense of orientation was of great help in navigating the local bus routes during a family visit to Costa Rica.

Dick was a charming, handsome man with an intellectual curiosity and an interest in trying to solve problems of all kinds. He enjoyed keeping up with world events, having political discussions, doing puzzles, and reading a good mystery novel. He and Pris actively promoted cross-cultural events, whether in the US or abroad. In Tunisia, they helped organize an exhibit on Islamic Arts, for which Dick photographed each item and put together the display at the Tunis Hilton. They designed an exhibit, From Tents to City Sidewalks, which introduced the Arab World to kids, for the Children’s Museum of Denver. Dick used his creativity to further cultural understanding, but also to please his girls. His oldest daughter proudly remembers the prize-winning Big Bird Halloween costume he made for her when living in Tunisia. Both girls spent hours of fun playing in an old wooden packing crate that he had lovingly painted and transformed into a playhouse on wheels.

Though their lives were spent discovering many places around the world, Dick, Pris, and the girls kept returning to Denver, which they were proud to call home for more than 30 years. They were loyal supporters of the Denver Center for Performing Arts, enjoying many an evening at the symphony or a matinée to see a musical.  Dick contributed much time and energy to the Downtown Denver Resident’s Organization, helping to make LoDo a more pleasant place to live. He was instrumental in acquiring the rights to the city-owned property for the construction of a playground for the neighborhood and public use. And, of course, he was an active proponent of and contributor to the project. He helped monitor the health of the trees planted along city sidewalks and actively promoted public transportation. His grandkids fondly remember their early morning bike rides with Grandpa along the creek, filling up his saddle bags with groceries, and making regular visits to the skate park.

Dick is survived by daughters Laura Roberts of Glen Mills, PA and Wendy Zambalas (Zacharie) of Gif-sur-Yvette, France; granddaughter Alexia Zambalas of Denver, CO; grandson Luca Zambalas of Paris, France; brother John Roberts (Susan) of Morehead City, NC; sisters Dale Megill (Bob) and Connie Amend (Bill), both of Glen Mills, PA, and by the fruit of a 15-year project of patience and passion with his beloved Pris, in the form of a book published by Lehigh University Press in 2008: Thomas Barclay (1728-1793): Consul in France, Diplomat in Barbary.

Our loving dad, grandpa, brother, and friend will be dearly missed.