LV consultant for developers, Oglesby dies

Jean Reid Norman

Tuesday, April 27, 2004 | 10:54 a.m.

For the past 10 years, as Dick Oglesby battled cancer, he worked on making his vision of Las Vegas become a reality.

In 1994, as he traveled to UCLA for cancer treatments, he stayed on as vice president of community development for Howard Hughes Corp. as it built Summerlin.

After a relapse years later and a stem cell transplant, he went to work for Rich MacDonald developing MacDonald Highlands in Henderson.

And recently, as his health faded, Oglesby, project manager for the Parkway Center, pushed a vision for the former railroad yard downtown that includes 61 city-owned acres that Mayor Oscar Goodman sees as key to redevelopment.

Richard Oglesby died Thursday of the non-Hodgkins lymphoma he fought for a decade. He was 57.

Services are planned for Thursday, with visitation at 1 p.m. and services following at 2 p.m. at Palm Mortuary, 7400 W. Cheyenne Ave.

His planning and development work "was what he loved to do," said Connie Oglesby, his wife of 35 years. "Dick taught me what courage looked like."

As a key member of the management team that made Summerlin what it now is, Oglesby kept a "game face" through the years of illness, said Kevin Orrock, executive vice president of Howard Hughes Corp., the Summerlin developer.

"He would never let others bear what he was going through," Orrock said. "You would never know he was sick."

Developer Mark Fine, who also worked with Oglesby in Summerlin, said throughout the illness Oglesby "never gave up his sense of pride in what he does."

"It always amazed me," Fine said. "I don't know if I could do what he did."

Born Oct. 12, 1946, in Phoenix, Oglesby graduated from the University of Arizona and started his career selling photocopiers, his wife said. He soon moved to selling commercial real estate, and never turned back.

Oglesby came to Las Vegas in 1990 to consult on the Summerlin development, then moved his family here in 1992 when he when to work full time for Howard Hughes Corp. He left the company in 1996, intending to take a job in Southern California, his wife said, but then he fell ill.

After he recovered from his stem cell transplant, he joined MacDonald and developed Dragon Ridge Golf Course, as well as helping on MacDonald Highlands. He later formed a consulting firm, R O Consulting.

Recently Oglesby, as project manager of Parkway Center, was responsible for leading a task force planning the development of the 61 city-owned acres in downtown Las Vegas, Orrock said.

In addition to his wife, Oglesby is survived by his three children -- Christopher, Patrick and Molly of Las Vegas, sister Naomi Oglesby of Phoenix and brother William of Fresno, Calif. The family requests donations to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, Southern Nevada chapter.