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Ricardo J. Novo was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, November 16, 1927. His father thought knowing English was important for future success, so Ricardo and his brother were sent to St. Lucy's school, run by Irish monks, where he became known as Dick(ie). As a teenager his schedule included getting up at 4:00 to row on the river, then going to work as a junior clerk for the local office of Deloitte, the international accounting firm, and continuing to university classes in economics at night. A chance to work on one of Remington Rand’s Univac computers took him to Caracas. After a flying vacation to several cities in the United States he asked to be transferred to San Francisco. Turned down, he quit and emigrated anyway. In California he found an auditing job with paper company Crown Zellerbach (after a brief stint teaching tango for Arthur Murray). At Crown a mentor introduced him to the finer points of jazz. At the "Residence Club" where they were both living he met Shirley von Kleinsmid. They married, had a baby and bought a house in Sausalito. And then he was offered a job back with Deloitte to help open management consulting services in their South American offices. The little family moved to Buenos Aires where it grew by two more daughters and a son and managed to keep close ties to both sides of their family, with home leave back to California every year. It was an opportunity to begin a scientific study of the relative merits of Argentine and California wines. Dick also became fascinated with golf and one year won Deloitte's trophy The next challenge was to "open up the Middle East” by offering management consulting at their offices in Amman, Cairo, Riyadh and Dubai. So in 1979 they were off to live in Athens, where there was an American high school for their teenagers. It also meant Dick really traveled to work. He tried to learn Arabic and Shirley tried to learn Greek. In only 18 months they moved again, to Madrid. New wines to taste and country to explore. The children went successively off to college and it became less fun to be so far away from them. So in 1988 Dick retired and by 1990 they had moved to Haverford, PA, by no coincidence two blocks from their first grandson. Dick and Shirley continued to travel extensively, so he could see more of the world than airports, hotels and the office. To the end he was a serial connoisseur of his many interests -- travel, golf, wine, jazz, Argentine soccer and, finally, Z-scale model trains. Ricardo Novo passed away suddenly March 13, 2015, age 87, in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Dear husband of Shirley (nee von KIeinsmid), father of Laura Novo (Stephen Chawaga), Patricia Novo, Sandra Novo (Richard Weinland) and Daniel Novo (Tiffany Johnson). Beloved “Grandpa Chocolate” of Tim, Peter and Mary Chawaga; Lucas, Mia and Noah Weinland; and Aidan and Oliver Novo. Services will be private. The family requests no flowers, but donations in Ricardo’s memory may be made to Doctors without Borders.

Tributes

Ricardo J. Novo

November 16, 1927 - March 13, 2015