Meade A. Livesay

1918 - 2009

Meade A. Livesay, retired senior vice president of Hughes Aircraft Company and President of Radar Systems Group, passed away February 20, 2009 in Rancho Mirage California. He was ninety-one years old. He had enjoyed playing golf and being a philanthropist in the desert for the last twenty-three years. Livesay joined Hughes in 1950 already experienced in radar design from Gilfillan Brothers, Inc. and electronics from Westinghouse and Douglas Aircraft. He also had been with RKO Pictures in Hollywood, California, upgrading all the technical aspects of sound production for the studio. At Hughes he had been recognized as a visionary, associated with the development of the entire series of Hughes airborne armament control systems, both in technical and management roles. Radar Systems Group was noted, among other things, for bringing the best in airborne radar systems to the F14, F15, F18 and Stealth Bomber wherever it was deployed around the world. He pioneered the groundbreaking book "An Introduction to Airborne Radar" which took the technical advances to airborne radar that had become cloaked in jargon and made them accessible to engineers. He is also cited in "Testing Death: Hughes Aircraft Cold War Test Pilots and Cold War Weaponry." He served on various boards including the Thomas Jefferson Research Center. Born in Durbin, Pochahantas County, West Virginia December 9, 1917, Meade played basketball and was class president in Charleston High School as well as Sigma Chi fraternity president at West Virginia University where he graduated with a BS in mechanical engineering in 1941. A stevedore on the Great Lakes before college, he also served as an officer in the Navy during World War II, earning several battle stars. He attended graduate school at New York University and UCLA. Meade was predeceased by his first wife, Costa Rican born electrical engineer Carmen Venegas Livesay. He is survived by his second wife born in England, Elga Livesay, his daughter Karen Livesay and her husband Randy Conilogue of Sedona, Arizona, and Elga's daughter and son-in-law Valerie and Andy Watts of Barbados, West Indies, and son and daughter-in-law John and Cecilia Crawley of Toronto, Canada. Memorial Service will be held 1pm Saturday February 28, 2009 at the Ramon Chapel of Forest Lawn, 69855 East Ramon Road, Cathedral City, California, 92234. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Church of Joy, 38900 Vista Dunes Road, Rancho Mirage, California 92270