Ora Alfred Spaid Jr.

1921-2010

WILMORE, Kentucky -- Ora Alfred Spaid Jr., 88, died on July 3 at the Thomson-Hood Veterans Center in Wilmore where he had been a resident for the past three and a half years.

Born in the kitchen of his boyhood home in South Bend, Indiana in 1921, he was a man of diverse experience and talents.

He served as an Army Air Corps navigator, during World War II, flying missions over Germany until his B17 was shot down and he was held as a POW at Stalag Luft 1 in Barth, Germany. He received the Purple Heart and other citations of valor. After the War, he attended Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University on the G.I. Bill and then took his first newspaper job, fresh out of college, at the McCook Daily Gazette.

He was editor of the McCook Daily Gasette in the early 50s and then a reporter and religion editor at the Louisville Courier-Journal where he wrote the popular "A Reporter Goes to Church" column and won numerous awards for journalism. Following his career as a journalist, he served in the "War on Poverty" as executive director of the Community Action Program in Asheville, North Carolina and then as a consultant for the Office for Economic Opportunity in Washington, D.C.

He was a management trainer, curriculum designer and consultant, video producer, an early innovator in educational television, and the author of many articles and books, including one collection of stories about his beloved dogs titled Where the Grass Is Greener and Dogs Had Better Keep Off.

Later in his life he moved to Madison, Indiana, where he worked as a free-lance writer and an adjunct writing instructor at Hanover College.

He is survived by three children and their families, Gregory Preston Spaid and wife, Susan Roettger Spaid of Gambier, Ohio, Peggy Sue Eberhardt of Louisville, Kentucky, and Judy Spaid Edwards and husband, Mark Edwards of Louisville; and five grandchildren, Erica Spaid, Simon Spaid, Katherine Edwards, Susan Edwards and Sara Eberhardt.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Thomson-Hood Veterans Center, 100 Veterans Drive, Wilmore, KY 40390 or the Madison-Jefferson Animal Shelter, 2727 Hannah Drive, Madison, Indiana 47250