Richard Paul (Dick) Shlakman
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Richard Paul (Dick) Shlakman, born and bred in Brooklyn, New York, on April 18, 1939, passed peacefully (all praise to morphine) on November 6, 2022 at his home in Plano, Texas. He was, to his great surprise and pleasure, 83 years of age. He is survived by his loving companion, caregiver, best friend and spouse of 44 years (counting, as he always did, the 7 years spent as pre-married loving companions), Sarah Shlakman, his two daughters, Melissa Mayer Scott and Daisy Shlakman, their husbands Mitchell Scott and Andrew Ettinger, his two grandchildren, Dylan Paris Scott and Tallisen Samarel Scott, his brother, Kenneth Stuart, and a smattering of cousins. Ever thoughtful, Dick wrote this obituary for posthumous publication and is solely responsible for its content!
Dick graduated from Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn, NY in 1956, with absolutely no academic distinction, and graduated from Adelphi University in Garden City, NY in 1960 with an equally mediocre academic record. At both institutions, he majored in extracurricular activities. He was a member of the golf team in both high school and college and remembers fondly every birdie he made in every practice and actual match during that eight-year period - two, and both in practice rounds. While in his mid-teens, Dick read a biography of Clarence Darrow and for years thereafter, in his fantasies, saw himself strutting in front of a jury defending the innocent and oppressed from outrageous injustices. The few A's scattered around in his college transcript, coupled with an outsized score on the LSAT, allowed him to squeak into Columbia University School of Law, from which he graduated, with honors, in June, 1963. (His grade point average made him number 7 in his graduating class, and caused his mother to call him her "academic fall orchid" for the rest of her life.)
Dick accepted a Clerkship on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He learned during that year that there were places in the world where Dr. Martin Luther King made speeches that stirred the soul, where JFK and Jackie could, however briefly, re-create Camelot, where rent was affordable, theater accessible, and where alternate side of the street parking did not exist. Determined to overcome his Brooklyn accent and become an ex-New Yorker, he stuffed his mouth full of pebbles and, like Demosthenes, recited great speeches over the roar of the rush-hour traffic. (Demosthenes used the sound of waves, rush-hour traffic not being available.) Following his clerkship and before starting a career in private practice, in July 1964, Dick participated in the "1964 Freedom Summer." He spent 5 weeks in Mississippi working with local activists attempting to register African-American citizens to vote and teaching, in a "Freedom School," about the life and times of Jackie Robinson.
Dick was hired as an Associate by a prominent Washington, DC law firm and became a partner on January 1, 1970. He was also an Adjunct Professor of Law at the Georgetown University School of Law for 3 years, in the mid-1970s. Although he represented many clients in a number of legal areas (including acting as a volunteer attorney for the ACLU and representing, before the Supreme Court of the United States, a number of young people arrested for protesting America's involvement in the Vietnamese war on the steps of the Capital Building without a permit), his principal client, starting in 1969, was Electronic Data Systems Corp. ("EDS"), the Dallas based corporation founded by H. Ross Perot. In 1982 he was invited to leave his law firm and join EDS to serve as General Council for its divisions operating in the Washington D. C. area. In 1989 he and Sarah relocated to Dallas, Texas, and Dick became General Counsel of EDS worldwide. In 1992 Dick became Vice President of Sales and Marketing for one of EDS's business units. He served in that capacity until 1995. Whatever limited successes he may have achieved in the legal and business worlds, Dick's proudest accomplishment was the promotion of many of the people he hired to work for EDS to positions of responsibility, and commensurate reward considerably above any they ever imagined for themselves before joining the workforce.
After his EDS career, Dick remained active and engaged in multiple civic, educational, and charitable activities during the period of his retirement. Among other endeavors, he adapted materials from various sources and created, and taught, a course in personal finance targeted at the 7th grade and 12th grade levels. For 6 years he was a volunteer driver delivering hot meals for the Meals on Wheels program. For 11 years, seven as President, he was a member of the Board of Directors of the HOA in which he and Sarah lived. He served on the Board of Directors and was Treasurer of the Turner 12, a not-for-profit charity operating in South Dallas whose mission is to assist students living in that area to become first-generation college graduates. Dick and Sarah volunteered to be a Big Brother/Big Sister couple, and individually Dick took on several other mentorships, both under the auspices of a Richardson, Texas organization which pairs mentors and middle school students in need of adult guidance and companionship, and 3 student members of the Turner 12. And he served 5 years as a member of the Plano Public Relations Commission, where he was responsible for a total rewrite of the grant application form and scoring criteria.
As one who believed in the importance of lifetime education, from the Fall term in 2005 through the Fall term in 2010, Dick was enrolled in the Masters of Liberal Arts program at Southern Methodist University. He was awarded his Masters Degree, with a 4.0 GPA, in January, 2010. Several poems and several essays
written by Dick were, over the years following his graduation, published in Pony Express(ions), an SMU on-line literary journal. Dick served as the Nonfiction Editor of that publication from 2011 through 2013. In 2013, Dick largely stopped writing poetry and nonfiction as he attempted to become a published cruciverbalist. Although there were many rejection letters in the years that followed, over three dozen puzzles he created or co-created were published in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, the Dallas Morning News, the newspapers that subscribe to puzzles distributed by the Universal syndicate, the Chronicle of Higher Education, three compilations of crossword puzzles published by Simon & Schuster, two syndicated compilations of puzzles published by the Gannett syndicate, and on an online crossword puzzle website. He mentioned these accomplishments on every possible occasion for all the years that followed.
Perhaps Dick's most endearing traits, according to his friends, were his optimism and sense of humor. While his name and the word "humble" were never used in the same sentence, unless separated by the word "not", Dick was as comfortable making fun of himself as he was in humiliating any witness testifying for an adversary of any client he represented. It was Dick who bestowed upon himself the title of "King of the Restaurant Coupons." He delighted in sharing a good meal at a favorite restaurant, with close friends, and revealing a 25% or $25 off coupon just before the check was presented. Happy moments, those!
Dick's life was made more comfortable, productive, and enjoyable by his home care health aides, who became more like family than aides, Cindy Cronberger for well over a decade and for over six years by Tammy Potter to both of whom he and the other members of his family owe a great deal of gratitude. The nurses and other support system specialists of the Anchor of Hope hospice were a blessing to Dick and Sarah and were largely responsible for Dick being able to fulfill his wish of passing peacefully at his home.
A celebration of life service, followed by a reception, will be held at Restland Funeral Home, 9220 Restland Road, Dallas Tx, 75382 at 10:00am Monday, November 14th 2022. Dick will not be wearing a suit and it is not necessary that those attending do so. Business casual or beachfront casual are the order of the day. Sad speeches or exaggerations of Dick's virtues are strongly discouraged, while memories of good times together are very much in order. Playing a recording of "Earth Angel" will remind Sarah of a moment that Dick held dear for the remainder of his life, and playing a recording of "The Cats in the Cradle" will probably cause him to cry, turning his ashes into a cement like mush, as he always did when he heard it while alive. Because Dick chose cremation, there is no headstone on which to engrave an epithet. If there were, it would read "That's All
Folks". Instead, his urn humbly requests: "Pardon my dust". Please do not send flowers to Restland or to Sarah's home. Take whatever money you might have spent on flowers or tributes and donate it to any charity of your choice, or if you are feeling blue for any reason, buy yourself a fun gift, whether it be liquid or solid.