Necrology
Richard Thomas Vacca '64
May. 1, 1942-Aug. 24, 2022
Richard Thomas Vacca ’64 died on Aug. 24, 2022, in Baltimore. Born in Albion, N.Y., on May 1, 1942, he came to Hamilton from Albion High School. On the Hill, he majored in psychology, minored in economics, and was a member of Delta Phi fraternity. A devout Roman Catholic, he was a member of the Newman Club for all four years and was its president during his final year. It was also during his senior year that he met Mary Elizabeth Hitchcock, then a junior at Elmira College, who visited Hamilton as the date of a fellow Delta Phi. They did not connect, but Dick and Mary did.
Following graduation, on July 18, 1964, Dick reported for duty at the Navy Officer Candidate School in Newport, R.I. Following his commissioning as an ensign and six months of additional training, he became a supply corps officer and served for three years. He later observed that this assignment laid the foundation for his subsequent career in the financial services industry. On June 23, 1965, he and Mary Hitchcock were married in Mentor, Ohio. They would have two daughters and a son.
Discharged from the Navy with the rank of lieutenant in 1968, Dick began his career in financial services at CIGNA Corp., first in sales, then field management, supervision, corporate training, and as controller. In 1977, his marriage dissolved. A couple of years later, in Bloomfield, Conn., he married Evelyn “Beau” Burgess, who was also employed by CIGNA. They made their home in West Hartford.
Leaving CIGNA in 1984, he became senior vice president of Summit Financial Resources, an investment advisory firm, but in 1987 returned to a CIGNA subsidiary, Loyalty Life Insurance, as a sales consultant for supplementary medical benefits. Two years later, he started as a marketing executive for financial planning at the New England Financial Group in Rochester. At this point, Albion became home again for Dick.
By the mid-1990s, he stepped away from financial services after nearly 30 years. In 1997, he and Beau moved to nearby Mt. Morris, where they purchased and began to renovate a Victorian-era home. That work, which drew upon carpentry skills he had learned in childhood, fostered an interest in antiques, an affinity that Beau shared. While antique dolls attracted her attention, Dick was drawn to inkwells, dip and fountain pens, and tin toys, among other small, historical objects. What began as something of a hobby would become Richbeautiques, which Dick would later describe as “a general antique/collectables business that specialized in vintage: dolls, teddy bears, and toys.”
It became a commitment, as he wrote in his 40th reunion yearbook: “I’ve spent the last 15 years on the road doing 30-40 [antique] shows per year from Boston to Chicago, Maine to Kentucky, & anywhere in between.” That this was more than a hobby is demonstrated by the fact that in 2005, they moved from New York to Hedgesville, W.V., to be closer to where many of those antique shows took place. Hedgesville is close to Interstate 81, making their travel north to New England and south to the Carolinas and beyond quite convenient.
Those shows provided opportunities to meet and talk with other collectors and the general public, conversations that included lessons on the evolution of writing instruments and the history of other objects he exhibited and sold. He observed in his 50th reunion yearbook that “relationships make the difference in a successful life; though preparation and discipline sure help a lot!”
Beyond the world of antiques, Dick was also a master gardener who grew fruits, vegetables, and flowers in great abundance. Another advantage of the move to West Virginia was a longer growing season; winters and inclement weather would find him tinkering at his work bench.
Dick attributed to his education on the Hill many of the skills that contributed to his success in life. Again from his 40th reunion yearbook: “The rigors of my Hamilton liberal arts education forced me to be both diverse in my interests and disciplined in my consistent efforts to achieve. The ups and downs of my life demanded resourcefulness, flexibility, and being true to myself. My Hamilton experience equipped me to keep on keeping on.”
Richard T. Vacca is survived by his wife, two daughters, one son, and eight grandchildren.
