Richard Bennett Bicknell

Richard (Dick) Bicknell, January 18, 1926, to October 27, 2025

Richard "Dick" Bicknell, in his 100th year, recently passed away from pneumonia. Dick approached everything in his remarkable life with enthusiasm, determination, generosity, goodwill, and a lively, warm, sometimes irreverent sense of humor that made everyone love him, including his wife, Suzanne, who survives him after 77 years of marriage. He leaves behind his three children; Bruce (Cindy) Bicknell, Ben (Sue) Bicknell, and Nancy (Robin Shore) Larkin; eight grandchildren, and fourteen great-grandchildren. While he was proud of his outstanding career, he said his greatest legacy and source of pride was his family.

Born January 18th, 1926, in Utica, New York, Dick began a lifelong commitment to excellence in every endeavor he pursued. He was a musical prodigy, performing on the trap drums at age four on the radio and in person. He was called "the boy drummer of New York". Music was his lifelong avocation. He won numerous state and national competitions in drumming, marimba, and trumpet. One of his greatest joys was to sing and conduct for choirs and musical groups, which he did in every city he lived in.

Music was not his professional career, however. While Dick received a scholarship to the Eastman School of Music and was accepted for the engineering school at MIT, because of World War II and the Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps, he attended the Rochester Institute of Technology and graduated with a BS/ME in mechanical engineering, Phi Beta Kappa honors. It was there that he met his wife, Suzanne Curtiss.

He started his career with General Motors, Diesel Division, in Cleveland, Ohio. He had an extraordinary ability to solve problems in innovative ways and rose through the ranks in the automotive industry, working for Mack Trucks, White Motors, and McCord Corporation as V.P. of Engineering, and after a short time at their corporate office, joined Davidson Rubber in Dover, N.H. as V.P. of Engineering. There, he helped invent the lifesaving plastic bumpers for automobiles. Dick was not just an expert engineer; he was known as a compassionate leader and manager. His career pinnacle was accepting the position of President of the prestigious and well-known Greenlee Tools corporation in Rockford, Illinois, where he retired after solidifying their reputation for high-quality professional tools. He and Suzanne then moved back to their favorite place, New England, and settled in Eliot, Maine.

He was a Rotarian for many years, served the community in town government, and through his local church. Dick skied until he was 83. As members of the Portsmouth Yacht Club, Dick and Sue loved to sail (for Dick, the faster the better). They shared a lifelong spirit of curiosity and discovery, moving from city to city and traveling the world together, both by sea and land. Dick was a beautiful, big-hearted, kind, vivacious force of nature. He wanted to make the world a better place. And he did.

Funeral services are Monday, November 3, at the JS Pelkey Funeral Home, 125 Old Post Road -POB 843, Kittery, Maine 03904. Viewing starts at 10 am, service at 11:00 am, internment and reception to follow. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Hospice Help Foundation.