Dick Spady

1923 - 2016

Dick Spady

Dick Spady, the namesake of Seattle's iconic Dick's Drive-In Restaurants, died peacefully in Seattle on January 10, 2016. He was 92 years old, and the last surviving co-founder of the 62-year-old local restaurant chain.

Incredibly optimistic and entre-preneurial from childhood, Dick was a newspaper boy by the time he was 9, a railroad switchyard operator at 18, then later rented airplanes to take aerial photos of local farms and sold them to the farmers door-to-door, created the first on-campus movie theater at his college, and worked as a commercial real estate agent, all before opening his first restaurant at age 30.

Born October 15, 1923, in Portland, Oregon, to Johannes W. Spady and Elsie Elizabeth Ewen, Dick was raised there and graduated from Grant High School.

Dick served in the Navy during World War II as part of a Seabee Construction Battalion in the South Pacific.

After being honorably discharged at the end of the war, Dick used the GI Bill to attend college. Enrolling at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Dick joined the Air Force Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) and was elected President of the Alpha Delta Chapter of the Theta Xi fraternity. Dick graduated from OSU in 1950 with a Bachelor of Science degree from the College of Business.

Soon after the Korean War began in June 1950, Dick's Air Force Reserve unit was activated and Dick was stationed with the 8th Air Force at Itazuke Air Base in Southern Japan. As the Commissary Officer he was responsible for feeding thousands of active-duty troops. Dick continued to serve in the Air Force Reserves until he retired with the rank of Lt. Colonel.

Dick's experience with construction, feeding thousands of troops, and sense of duty to others while serving in different branches of the military during two wars, helped prepare him for later life as a business leader, family man, community supporter, and "civilization builder" (as he called his lifetime of volunteer work.)

In 1953, Dick and two partners, Dr. B.O.A. "Tom" Thomas and H. Warren "Ghorm" Ghormley began planning to open the first Dick's Drive-In restaurant. The first restaurant, on NE 45th Street in Wallingford, opened on January 28, 1954.

Shortly after opening the first restaurant, Dick met Ina Lou Arnold, a Navy Officer from Rossville, Georgia, then stationed in Seattle, during a church retreat at Seabeck, Washington. They were married on August 5, 1955, at Seattle First Methodist Church at 5th and Columbia downtown.

Their first home was a modest houseboat at the southeastern end of Lake Union but they soon moved to Capitol Hill after Lou became pregnant with their first child. In 1962, Dick and Lou moved to Bellevue - close to the proposed St. Peter's United Methodist Church where they were among its founding members.

Dick and Lou went on to raise five children. Dick was a strong supporter of his church, a proud founding member of the Bellevue Overlake Rotary Club, and a longtime member of the World Future Society. His sense of service to others extended from his community to his country and beyond. To advance these ideals, Dick founded both the Forum Foundation and the Stuart C. Dodd Institute for Social Innovation to increase "social capital" in our communities.

His longtime volunteer work earned him many awards, including the Bishop's Award in 2001, an honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters from the University of Russia's Academy of Education in 2003, the Bruce Briggs Community Service Award in 2008, and the Ruckelshaus Award for Collaborative Policy in 2014.

Dick was preceded in death by his younger brother, Norm Schmeer. Dick is survived by his wife of 60 years (Lou), his youngest brother (Greg Schmeer), his five children (John, Jim, Walt, Carol, and Doug), his four daughters-in-law (Tatyana, Fawn, Nan and Julie), his six grandchildren (Alex, Saul, Chad, and Danielle Spady, Jasmine Donovan, and Lucas DesPres), and his three great grandchildren (Aiden Spady, and James and Robert Donovan).

A private memorial service will be held next month. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made to local charities serving homeless people and families.