O Tempora!

My dad, Richard H. Timberlake, Jr. PhD, died on May 22, 2020, after a brief illness.  He was 97 in whole years, missing his 98^th birthday by about a month.

I feel very lucky to have had my dad for such a long time. He was in good physical and health for his age until a few weeks ago. Part of the reason for Dad’s good health was my youngest brother, Tom, who has lived with our parents for the last few years & has worked tirelessly to care for them.

Dad was a WWII veteran, a B-17 copilot who flew 26 missions from southeast England to Germany. He received three Purple Hearts: 1 from flak on his 5^th mission, and 2 due to flak and flying glass from the windshield during his final mission. He wrote a memoir of his wartime experiences: They Never Saw Me Then.

After the war, Dad became an economist. He received his MS degree from Columbia University and his PhD from the University of Chicago. (One of his professors there was Nobel laureate Milton Friedman.) Dad taught, did research, and published books and articles for the rest of his life. Institutions where he worked were include Muhlenberg College, Norwich University, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Florida State University, and the University of Georgia, where he ultimately retired. Dad was an Adjunct Scholar at the Cato Institute. His most recent works were Constitutional Money, published in 2013, and Gold, the Real Bills Doctrine, and the Fed: Sources of Monetary Disorder, 1922-1938, (as coauthor). It was published in 2019.

My dad was quite an influence on me and my siblings. His flying experience inspired interest in airplanes in me and my brothers Dave, Chris, and Tom. Dave and I never got beyond model airplanes, but Chris and Tom became military pilots and retired from the USAF. Both of them are now pilots for Delta.

Dad taught us the values of work hard work and personal responsibility. I have tried live up to those values and to instill the same values in my children.

I miss Dad very much. Dad & I often exchanged emails and sometimes had phone conversations. I visited the parents’ home once or twice a year for the past few years. It was always good to see my dad. And I’m proud to be named after him.