Richard Carlyle Taytroe (Sr.) was born in Boston on March 4, 1935, and passed away in Los Angeles on September 26, 2020, due to “complications” from a substituted blood thinner, which caused severe internal bleeding, while he was awaiting surgery to replace his abdominal feeding tube.
He was a loyal and steadfast father, whose love for his family outweighed all else. After their divorce, every time his family moved away, he packed up and followed, first from Massachusetts to West Virginia in the mid 1970s, then to Ohio in the early 1980s, and finally to Los Angeles in the late 1980s, where he resided for over 30 years until his death. He always missed his home, Medway, Massachusetts, and frequently talked about his dream to return someday.
He graduated from Medway High School in 1952, and attended college at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. As a young adult, he worked in a record store, but his lifelong career was as a draftsman, meticulously creating architectural drawings by hand, with perfect lines and lettering. While working, he delighted in listening to old time radio suspense, adventure, and comedies. Always a dapper gentleman, he preferred to wear suits and ties everywhere he went. He spent his life presenting thoughtful gifts and helping others in need, often giving more money than he could afford, because he felt they needed it more than he did. He loved all animals, especially cats and dogs, and he always carried pet food to share with homeless animals.
When his children were young and asked about his service in the Korean War, he said he could never reveal what his work was, as all highly secret, and he kept those secrets for his entire life. He did explain that he worked in cryptography, encoding and decoding messages, and he taught his children how to create and solve basic secret codes, as well as building electronics, and the value of learning foreign languages.
His other great love was music, especially symphony performances, opera, and piano sonatas, but also some popular music, as well as weird and humorous artists like Spike Jones and Tom Lehrer, among many. During his free time, he enjoyed “conducting” symphonies on the stereo in his living room. He was a living classical music encyclopedia, so anyone could hum a small bit of a melody they wanted to know about, and he could immediately identify the piece of music, walk to a shelf in his extensive music library, and pull out an album to play for the querent, saying, “I have several performances, but this is my favorite.” At his Medway High School reunion gathering in 2016, his classmates enjoyed remembering with him about his songwriting and musical compositions as a young man, and they hummed and sang some of the notes and lyrics with him. He also wrote and published a piano sonata in the early 1970s.
He had music running through his veins, and imbued all his children and grandchildren with his amazing talent, to carry on and share his musical gifts with the world. His daughters and son are accomplished in operatic singing, woodwinds, and guitar. His grandchildren have studied opera, orchestral instruments, classical guitar, composition, and music education, and all are very talented composers and public performers; one also teaches music. Richard was able to attend his eldest grandchild’s Master’s Degree graduation from the Boston Conservatory in 2016.
Richard was preceded in death by his father, William Joseph Taytroe, in 1941, and his mother Mabelle Caroline (Gibbs) Taytroe, in 1971. He is survived by his children and their spouses, Frances Taytroe Acheson and Alazel Acheson; Laurel Taytroe and David Dryland; Richard Taytroe (Jr.) and Camelia Nyegre; and 6 grandchildren.
Richard will be buried near his mother, in the Evergreen Cemetery in Medway, Massachusetts.
Funeral arrangements are under the care of the Ginley Crowley Funeral Home, 3 Barber St. in Medway (www.ginleyfuneralhomes.com).