Article June 13, 2005 ISSUE

THE GENTLEMAN FROM CENTERVILLE

By Sara Hoagland Hunter

LIKE MOST UNSUNG HEROES Roy Richardson isn't someone you'd pick out of a crowd. He's also not someone you'd choose to interview for facile, self-serving sound bites.' Asked how he has been able to maintain his pure love for mankind throughout decades of serving the homeless, the imprisoned, the addicted, and the disabled, his expression is one of bewilderment. "It's easy to love people when you get to know them," he says.

It's not until I spend a tagging along with this deeply joyful man that I fully understand what "knowing" someone means to Roy Richardson.