Richard Prim

1950 - 2021

Richard Patrick Prim passed away peacefully on April 25, 2021 at age 70 from pancreatic cancer at the Glenn A. Kiser Hospice House in Salisbury, NC. He was born on August 17, 1950 in Concord, NC to William Edgar Prim and Ruth Walters Prim. He graduated from A. L. Brown High School in Kannapolis, NC in 1968 and then received his bachelor's degree from UNC Chapel Hill in psychology in 1972. After working as a social worker for a year, he spent the next almost 30 years teaching in the Kannapolis City Schools system, the majority of his career as a social studies teacher at A. L. Brown High School. Along the way he also obtained a masters degree in Education from UNC Charlotte. Richard was health-conscious and loved sports all his life. He played baseball as a child and later ran track, a sport in which he held long-standing records, and played basketball. As an adult he loved tennis, golf and bicycling, and was an avid fan of ACC basketball, especially the UNC Tarheels. In addition to touching the lives of hundreds of young people as a teacher, he also coached tennis, cross country running, and basketball. He had an outgoing personality, sense of humor, kindness, constancy, and a desire to be helpful. He married Constance Ann Stanton on October 19, 1996 when they were both 46 years old. They resided in Salisbury, NC from 1997. He is survived by Constance, his only sibling Michael Wayne Prim and Michael's wife (Carrie Benoit Salemi), his nephew (Peter Michael Prim), his niece (Sarah Liesl Prim Laughon), and his Swiggett cousins (Beverly Suitt, Melinda Hunter, and Kenneth), and their families. He was preceded in death by his parents and his cousin, Mary Elizabeth Lanier Swiggett. Following cremation, a private celebration of life will be held at a later date. Donations may be made to the Lustgarten Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research (lustgarten.org) and condolences and memories at www.whitleysfuneralhome.com.