Obituary of Richard Ronald Hardy

Richard died on Sunday, November 15, 2015 at the National Institutes of Health after a long courageous battle with acute myeloid leukemia. It was exactly one month after his 32nd wedding anniversary. He is survived by his wife Barbara, daughter Jennifer Vitale (Chris), son Richie (Richard, Jr), brothers Chuck and Ron (Carol) of the Philadelphia area, nieces and their families along with numerous cousins. He is preceded in death by his parents Charles and Margaret Hardy. Richard, the youngest of three, was born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. According to his brothers, when he was young he loved watching Zorro and would play the theme song record over and over again. When he chose an instrument to play at Cardinal Dougherty High School, he picked the drums because they made a lot of noise and he thought he might not have to practice as much. He graduated from LaSalle University with a degree in mathematics. Richard started working for the federal government in Philadelphia and taking numerous college computer classes. He then accepted a promotion and moved to northern Virginia to work for Military Management Traffic Command. This led to another advancement sending him to Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) before he relocated once more for a promotion with the Department of Defense (DOD) where he worked for Washington Headquarters Service, Directorate for Information Operations and Reports, and Defense Manpower Data Center. He ended his 38 year career with DOD. Richard served on the Board of Directors for his Homeowners Association and was also President. He received many awards throughout his career for excellence in his work. Richard was devoted to his family. He and Barbara married in 1983 and raised two wonderful children, Jennifer and Richie. Richard loved computers and anything technology-oriented. He also enjoyed photography and videotaping. He was known to film all the sports games as the children grew up and the coaches loved this. He helped coach baseball and basketball for many years. Richard loved Hershey's chocolate candy bars, chocolate ice cream, beef, and he developed an obsession for Coke Slurpees. Once he retired he was able to start playing computer games again and renew his love of reading action packed books. The beach was always one of his favorite places to be. Richard had a nice sense of humor and was liked by everyone. He was smart, kind, caring and thoughtful and just an all-around nice person. Richard will be missed by everyone that knew him.