Dr. Don Ridgeway

As an active faculty member of the NCSU Department of Physics for over 40 years, I had the privilege of having long discussions almost weekly with Professor Don Ridgeway over coffee or lunch. These discussions mostly covered diverse subjects and problems in theoretical physics. I am sure that many other faculty members and students in physics, statistics, and mathematics valued similar types of discussions with Dr. Ridgeway during this time. After retirement, Dr. Ridgeway and I continued...

I was a colleague of Don through much of his career. He had many interests and we conversed often, as we had adjoining offices in the Statistics Department at NCSU. Don was indeed bright and thoughtful. More importantly, he held himself and his students to a very high standard. Don pushed himself physically very hard as well. He was strong in many ways.

In the 1970s many of our faculty ate lunch together daily. I was new then. Don was always an enthusiastic participant at our...

Don was the most well-educated person I have known. But beyond that, and more importantly, he was kind, compassionate, and a lot of fun.

I first met him just after he retired from an illustrious career at NC State. He had embarked upon a new project: learning French. It was my fortune that he enrolled in my beginning French class. As a mere lecturer, I was initially somewhat intimidated by having in my class this professor who far outranked me.

I needn't have worried. Don was...