Dr. Richard William Wilsnack was born June 30, 1942, to William H. Wilsnack and Halina Zaikowski Wilsnack in Phoenix, Arizona. As a child of two psychiatric social workers, his parents’ work likely influenced his decision to study human behavior so he could help people and make a positive impact in the world.

Growing up, Richard’s family moved repeatedly for his parents’ careers, living in Phoenix, San Francisco, Chicago and finally Sacramento. In 1946, while living in Chicago, Richard and his parents faced a series of traumatic events. At the age of 4, Richard contracted polio and was forced to live in quarantine at the Children’s Hospital, where the only contact he could have with his parents was through a window in his room. At the same time Richard was diagnosed and placed in the hospital’s care, his 4-month-old sister, Janina, passed away due to a heart defect that could not be repaired. While these tragic events caused Richard and his parents much grief, he also said the circumstances made him a more resilient and empathetic person.

After the family moved to southern California, Richard again became a big brother with the arrival of his sister, Dorie, in 1948. Growing up, Richard showed an endless curiosity, a love for learning, and natural talents in a variety of pursuits. He was a Cub Scout, played tennis, won spelling bees, and excelled at piano and trumpet.

When the family moved to Sacramento, where his parents would live out the remainder of their lives, Richard’s musical skills led to multiple performances and incredible memories, whether it was playing in the high school jazz band all around the Sacramento area or singing in the glee club for high school audiences. In 1965, Richard’s participation in the opera “The Gondoliers” led to an opportunity to dance for the Queen Mother when she came to a rehearsal at the University of London. Though humble about his own musical talents, he delighted in the different artistic hobbies of his kids and grandkids and always encouraged them to maintain their interests in music and art throughout their lives.

While most kids would run at the mention of research projects, Richard was not like most kids, and he even created his own research subjects and testing protocol. During his childhood days in Sacramento, Richard created a project where he would stand on a street corner and collect the makes and models of passing cars in a notebook for analysis.

Richard attended La Sierra High School in Sacramento, where he played on the tennis team, served as student body president, and received a Bank of America Achievement Award before graduating in 1960.

Richard then attended Pomona College, and his appreciation for his college experience is most evidenced by his active role in the listserv of his Pomona classmates that he added to daily until his final days. Along with a prestigious education, his time at Pomona also included performing with the Glee Club, serving in ROTC and, in his junior year, serving as part of Crossroads Africa, which allowed him to spend a semester in Nigeria, coming home with a better understanding of international relations.

One of Richard’s proudest moments at Pomona was being a prominent member of the “Fabulous Foursome,” Pomona’s quiz bowl team, on the nationally televised General Electric College Bowl quiz program. The quiz bowl team retired as 5-time victors, being awarded $9,000 for Pomona’s scholarship fund. Richard later learned that Sharon regularly watched the College Bowl competition on TV with her family and very likely saw her future husband without knowing it.

After graduating Pomona in 1964 with a BA in Sociology, Richard attended the London School of Economics, gaining an MS in Economics in 1966. He then attended Harvard University, gaining a PhD in Sociology in 1975.

It was at Harvard that Richard met the love of his life, Sharon Carlson. They married on December 29, 1967, and began a family.

Following Harvard, Richard, Sharon and their growing family moved to Bloomington, IN, where Richard accepted the position of Assistant Professor of Sociology at Indiana University.

In 1978, Richard and Sharon accepted offers from the University of North Dakota, and moved their family to Grand Forks, ND, which would be their home for the next 4 decades.

Richard taught in the UND Sociology Department from 1978 until 1989, at which time he became professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at the UND School of Medicine. In addition to teaching medical students on topics related to medical ethics, healthcare and substance abuse, he also collaborated with his wife Sharon on federally funded research on alcohol use and related problems, with a focus on women, gender and culture.

Richard contributed to 18 publications with Sharon, including the book Gender and Alcohol: Individual and Social Perspectives, which they co-authored in 1997. He served as Co-Principal Investigator of the 1980-2010 longitudinal study of U.S. women and as Co-Investigator on both NIH/NIAAA grants to the GENACIS Project.

Richard and Sharon’s work allowed them to travel internationally for conferences, where they continued to gain a reputation for their groundbreaking research and where they made lifelong friendships with researchers from around the world. Even with his busy schedule, Richard remained a proud and attentive father, making sure to be there for recitals, to assist in his children’s homework projects, and to cook creative meals, all while always offering a sense of humor that not only his children inherited, but his grandchildren also.

Following their retirement from UND in 2015, Richard and Sharon moved to Falcon Heights, MN, to spend their golden years focusing on their grandkids.

Research and teaching were of great importance to Richard, but his priority was always his family. While Sharon was often the parent who the kids ran to with their emotional problems, Richard was the go-to parent for homework questions, random trivia knowledge, and helping more than one child out when cars stalled/got stuck in snowbanks/ran out of gas. He introduced his kids to music, comedy, and books that most kids were not lucky enough to learn about at such young ages. Upon learning that he would become a grandfather in 1998, Richard already knew what he wanted to be known as to his grandchildren. As his kids often thought of him as absent minded yet all-knowing, the nickname of “Golux”, taken from a whimsical wizard from James Thurber’s The 13 Clocks, a character Richard also happened to portray in a school production, was the perfect fit. Richard took great joy in being a grandfather, whether it was teaching the grandkids chess, pointing out unusual birds and, by doing so, creating the next generation of birding enthusiasts, or taking the grandkids on trips all over the world.

In addition to traveling with his wife and family, Richard enjoyed his retirement doing the New York Times crosswords (in pen), watching birds, and scouring the internet for interesting stories or funny conspiracy theories he would pass along on to his family.

Richard was preceded in death by his parents William and Halina Wilsnack of Sacramento, CA and his wife, Sharon Wilsnack of Falcon Heights, MN. Richard is survived by his children Joel (and wife Priya Sharma) of River Forest IL, Brian of Eagan MN, Peter of Seattle WA, Kirsten (and husband William Robinson) of Lakeville MN, Jonathan of Eagan MN, and grandchildren Anika and Rohan Wilsnack of River Forest IL and Noah, Eli, Mia and Icarus Robinson of Lakeville MN.

Richard is also survived by his sister Dorie Wilsnack and her husband Eric Bachman of East Barre, VT.

A memorial will be held Saturday, July 25 at 2 pm at 1666 Coffman Street, Falcon Heights, MN 55108.