Richard P. Shearman Is Dead At Age 69

Richard P. Shearman, 69, of 5 Grandview Avenue, Lake Placid, formerly of Jamestown, prominent as a sports promoter and known internationally for his work with the U.S. Olympic Skating Teams, died at 7:45 a.m. Tuesday, June 8, 1971 in Lake Placid Memorial Hospital.Mr. Shearman’s sports interests were many and varied encompassing sailing, skating, baseball, football and bobsledding. He accompanied the U.S. Olympic Speed Skating Team to Oslo, Norway, in 1952 and was with the team at the World Speed Skating competition in Moscow, Russia in 1955. In both countries and among peoples from many parts of the world he became a familiar figure with his genial personality, his flourishing mustache and his sturdy figure.

Mr. Shearman came from a well-known Jamestown family which operated Shearman Brothers Company (furniture makers) for many years. While in Jamestown he was associated in business in the company with his late brother, John C. Shearman.

Born in Jamestown March 27, 1902, his parents were the late Frank E. and Catherine Deery Shearman.

He was a communicant of SS Peter & Paul Catholic Church of Jamestown and a life member of the Knights of Columbus of Jamestown.

For years, Mr. Shearman was an avid booster of Jamestown’s entry in the Pennsylvania-Ohio-New York League, especially during the 1940s when this city was comparatively new in professional baseball.

A veteran member of the Chautauqua Lake Yacht Club, Mr. Shearman was a former president of the Central New York Racing Association and a former vice-president of the New York State Snipe Association, also serving for several terms as head of the Eastern Class E Scow Association.

In 1951, Mr. Shearman was named first vice-president of the Amateur Speed Skating Union of the U.S. and in 1952 was elected president of the U.S. Olympic Speed Skating Association and manager of the Olympic team.

In 1950, Mr. Shearman was a prime mover in organizing the St. Bonaventure University Football Boosters Club here. This was two years before the school dropped the gridiron sport.

Upon moving to Lake Placid in1955, he went into the restaurant business naming it “Handlebars Restaurant” and took up bobsledding as a hobby. H e became a regular at the Lake Placid races, graduating from novice to the senior division in which he took second place honors. He was the oldest man to compete in the U.S. on a two-man bobsled. He attended the world bobsled meet in Germany and aided in at least one nationwide drive for funds to send the American bobsledders to the Olympics.

Many here remember him as head of the tin can salvage drive during World War II when, to promote the fund, created the Tin Man with the help of Evald Forsberg, millwright at Shearman Brothers.

He was active in the Chamber of Commerce and the Kiwanis Club of Lake Placid. Other memberships include the Adirondack Bobsled Club; National AAU Committee for Bobsledding; Olympic Speed Skating Committee and Speed Skating Association. He was a former national speed skating judge and an honorary judge for Northern New York State.

Surviving are his wife, Mrs. Mary Mossman Shearman; three daughters, Mrs. George Schroeder III of West Chester, Pa., Mrs. Clifford Osmer, Medford, Mass., and Mrs. Charles A. Barone, Falconer; 12 grandchildren; and a sister, Mrs. Edward Underwood, Bemus Point.

A Requiem Mass will be celebrated at 9 a.m. Thursday in SS Peter & Paul Catholic Church. The Rev. Denman Dewey will be the celebrant. Burial will be in the family plot in Holy Cross Cemetery.

Friend will be received at the Lind Funeral Home.

The family suggests that memorials be made to the Lake Placid Memorial Hospital.