Newlyweds Richard and Sylvia Budd moved into Cloverdale Apartments in 1963, and he found work earning $1.25 an hour as a janitor.  In the years that followed, he bought and grew that janitorial company into a regional janitorial, landscape and maintenance company with more than 3,000 employees

He and Sylvia and some of their family now live on a farm on the Davie County side of the Yadkin River.  They’ve raised three sons, traveled the world and more or less settled down.  Richard has turned business matters over to son Joe, but stands by if needed.

Meanwhile, he’s a little freer to pursue his second calling: civic duty.  Senior Services is one of the beneficiaries.  As he enters his sixth year on the board, he’s agreed to be honorary co-chair of a new initiative called “Aging with Purpose” with Kelly King, the CEO of BB&T.

Richard credits the late Dr. Joe May with much of his success.  Having “frittered away” two years at a college in Maryland, he got a nudge from his brother, Dave Budd, a Wake Forest basketball star who later played five years with the New York Knicks in the NBA.  Dave told Richard to “go see Dr. May.”  So he drove down to Winston-Salem, found the May residence and knocked on the door.  “Come on in,” said the doctor.

And thus began a long friendship with a smart, generous mentor, who helped Richard get into High Point College.  He graduated with a business degree and 10 years ago was chosen to head the search committee that persuaded Nido Qubein to become the president of High Point, by then a university.  “We needed a businessman,” said Richard, one who could transform the institution and begin to move it into the elite group of the private colleges in the state.

Also high on Richard’s long list of civic activities are the Childress Institute for Pediatric Trauma, Wake Forest Baptist Health, the YMCA and the Winston-Salem Foundation.

As a businessman and Senior Services board member, he lauds “the professionalism and efficiency of Richard Gottlieb and his staff and their ability to deliver the product to those in need.”  He’s also become more aware of “the growing needs of many in our community who aren’t able to care for themselves.”

“This has become my calling,” said Richard, who grew up in Woodbury, NJ, one of eight children of a farmer/homebuilder and a schoolteacher.  His storybook life illustrates what he says has been his motto: “Learn, earn and give back.”

Written by: Jo Dawson, Volunteer Writer