Tribute to Mr Ron (Ickie) Larson

[Little Chacha]

I have known Mr Ron in 2009, it was a hot summer day in August when Mom, her friend and I drove down to Miami to visit him in a Veterans' Hospital. I know he lived in Saint Pete and Miami is on the other coast of Florida, in case you are not familiar with Florida, you drive south to go north. We live North of Miami and also North of St Pete, so my mom and my mom's friend drove to Miami. (MOST) People of Miami does not speak English, you ask them in English, they will answer you in Spanish. We did not have the translator app then, maybe we did but we did not know how to use it. Yes Siri was already on the market, but she was not as active as of today, where competition with Cortana, Alexa, Evi, S Voice, to name a few. I imagine how long and hot the travel was, six hours to be exact, maybe more - we passed by a local store to pick up a fruit basket for him. We were using this Navigation device - that kept us driving in circles, oh yeah you have probably experienced that before. Finally we reached our destination, The Veterans' Hospital in Miami. Did I tell you it was hot? We parked about half a mile from the entrance to the hospital, we were carrying a bag of fresh fruits, I told you we ordered from a local store, a laptop, we bought at our local best buy, boy it was heavy. This laptop by the way is a gift from YOU GUYS- for your wonderful friend and master of SOH, Ron Larson aka ICKIE. My mom was just the designated courier. a

Remember his music Prozzack Marijuana and Beer? I thought it was funny.

I learned that Mr Ron was dyslexic, that made him different from the rest of the majority of the people. He saw the world in another perspective. HE was a LEGEND. Farewell Mr Ron aka Ickie. May your soul rest in peace. You will surely be missed.

Little Chacha

PS.
On December 18th, I was trying to log on, I wanted to see how everyone was doing, but I failed. I could have at least talked (communicated here) to Mr Ron, when he was still alive. Belated Happy Birthday Mr Ron. It brings tears in my eyes how in his loneliness and being alone, he reached out to his only chosen friends and relatives here, on his last days of his life.

[PRB]

Thanks Hannah for that great post. We will all miss Ron around here! Good to see you here too!

[Milton Shupe]

Hannah, that is a very nice post; thank you for that. We shall all miss Ron.

I hope you and your mother are doing well.

Happy New Year

[Daveroo]

Hi Hannah,great story on that trip.bet yall made him feel better that day.im sorry you couldnt log on on the 18th,im sure he would have loved to have heard from you,as youand so many others here have said,we will all miss him deeply.

[Blackbird686]

Very nice tribute, Hannah. I remember when you and your mom delivered that new laptop for Ron, and I remember you posted pics here in the forums too. We will ALL miss him, he was a real trooper.

All the best, hope you had a good Christmas, and don't be a stranger. I'm sure all of us would enjoy hearing from you and your mom, now and then.

BB686

[txnetcop]

Thank you Hannah...that was very touching!
Ted

[Henry]

I DID NOT CALL HIM RON OFTEN WE DID GO WAY BACKi was just thinking about the time he got upset with me and sent me an email HENRY YOU WANT TO BE THE BOSS OF THE OUT HOUSE WELL HERES THE PASSWORDS TO THE SERVER THAT PUT ME UP TO MY EARS IN FECAL MATTERi then realized what he did do NO I JUST WANT TO BE A PART OF THE TEAMSPEACKING TO CK at the time HE'S OFF HIS MEDS AGAIN there eas atime when he was pissed at ck tek and myself changing our titles from ADMINISTRATOR to IS TRATOR WHEN I WENT INTO THE FIRST NURSING HOME HE MADE SURE I HAD INTERNET ACCESS TELEPHONE HE EVEN CALLED THE CEO OF TIME WARNER HERE HE HAD HEART PROBLEMS BUT HIS HEART WASPERFECT AMEN RON I GET WITH YOU ONE DAY AGOOD FRIEND HENRYTHANK YOU

[Tom Clayton]

Great to see you back on the board Hannah! I'll add my thanks for the tribute as well. Don't be a stranger - the door is always open!

[Francois]

Hi Hannah, thank you. RIP Icky ! :-(

[scotth6]

Hi Hannah,

That is a really touching tribute. Unfortunately I never spoke with or really got to know Ron. In fact I only just learned his name was Ron. Thanks for sharing your story which brings more great memories of a great man for many people here. Ron will be sorely missed. His spirit will live on in many ways, which says a lot about the man he was.

I saw a link from Dick "Rhumbaflabby" over at FS Developer, and I think on SOH too, of a website of Ron's that I didn't even know existed. It has many photos and lots of his recorded music, which is just fantastic. I was listening to and downloading all his tunes last night. I hope everyone has a look at this website. Ron was a great talented man and friend to many.

http://www.ronnylarson.com/


Cheers,

[magoo]

Ron had an amazing learning curve.

It was a non-stop uphill endeavor for him to keep abreast of technology and the required effort to keep this web site running smoothly, twenty four-seven. It was fascinating to read his accounts of DoS attacks, software buggery, hardware burnout, etc, etc, etc.....

And he'd always come up with solutions, many of them exceptionally creative. And fast. And calm. And the website carried on with it's public availability.....with hardly ever a hiccup. If you'd blink, you'd miss it. That's how switched on he was.

Calmly ahead of the curve, always, and regardless of anything else. What focus.

Beyond that, Ickie was also a remarkably patient man.

Back around the year 2001, we started a written brawl in this forum. It began as a rebuttal of a bully who was having a public beat-up on a virtual airplane modeler (these pages), and quickly went dynamite into the social-political off-topic. It was essentially a bar room style brawl that carried on non-stop for about five years.

Certainly Ickie had something to say about all the furniture we were busting up, but in fact, he demonstrated an extraordinary amount of restraint, an amazingly light touch. The litany of enraged complaints he received on a daily basis must have been deafening.

Whatever personal opinions he harboured, and may have even confided to close associates, in fact he showed no sign of bias online, save the quiet desire to preserve some reasonable protocol, and perhaps that we bust fewer tables and chairs so that others might actually come here to share their enjoyment of flight simulation.

After the dust finally settled, the man quietly wrote some changes to prevent any furtherance of such conflict, and allowed a close association with an independant and heavily padded discussion room that can be found at the bottom of the forum list here.

Effective, on the ball, non-partisan and fair beyond expectation. Vastly intelligent, vastly talented, and as patient as Buddha.

It has been, is now, and shall forever be, a certainty.

WE will all miss you, Ron Larson.

You had a powerful effect, Sir, in your disarmingly quite manner.

Thank you, Ickie.

Thank you.

[Panther_99FS]

'Lil Chacha!!!!!!!
That was a noble and humble thing that you and mother did back then...(seems like it was only yesterday)....

And this is a noble and humble thing that you've done now.......

Bless you both!

[Rami]

Thank you again for this wonderful tribute. Thanks for all you have done.

[Canelo]

I met Ron Larson in 1998 when he joined the Forums at combatfs.com and started to contribute to CFC and immediately ask him to help with moderation. Not long after That WreckRman2 (David Smith combatfs founder) bowed out and Ickie offered to get more involved with the web site and took a lead role along with Tekworm (Frank Eastman). Then in 2001 WreckRman2 returned and took total control of CFC, Ickie, Tekworm and myself were block access to the administration of the site and all of us were very upset beings the three of us had funded the site out of our own pockets since 1998. All of us quit CFC and a few weeks later Frank Eastman called me and had an idea to create a new site with hopes that the Loyal CFC base would follow us. Ron Larson offered to join in and help with the server management and helped Frank and I pay the hosting fees for the next few years. SOH was born and immediately became popular to our surprise so cost went way up to the point the three of us were paying several hundred dollars a month for hosting. Ickie took matters in to his own hands and leased the first dedicated server footing the first years cost. Ickie was not a wealthy man so he was going out on a limb and found the money for that first year. The next few years Tekworm, Henry, Douglas, Moparmike, Willy and myself helped Ickie with the ever increasing costs of bandwidth and the operation of SOH. It soon was costing more than we could handle so Ickie again stepped in and bought SOH first server and started accepting donations to help pay ever increasing costs.

We all know now that the site became very expensive very quickly and SOH loyal followers chipped in and settled the issue. Since then Tekworm and myself have gone in other directions but Ron Larson stayed on the same path and became the guiding force behind SOH. Ickie was SOH!

The Flight Sim Community owes a giant debt to Ickie for his service and his help in keeping Flight Simulator alive. Ickie made SOH the place to be for serious contributors and add-on designers and one of three sites that still serve the community. SOH was the only site of the three that never relied on ads and commercial assistance from software providers by Ickie's persistence of insisting on being a community funded site. Even though SOH was number three in users and traffic I believe the real heart and soul of the Flight Sim Community lived here.

Ickie gave everything he had to SOH and stands tall as our provider and deserves his place as a leader in Flight Simulation.

On a personal note, Ickie was a good friend, a good person and someone I always looked up to for the 19 years I have known him. I'll miss him and never forget our long talks and our friendship. I love you Buddy!

Vaya con dios mi Amigo

[Milton Shupe]

... snipped ...

The Flight Sim Community owes a giant debt to Ickie for his service and his help in keeping Flight Simulator alive. Ickie made SOH the place to be for serious contributors and add-on designers and one of three sites that still serve the community. SOH was the only site of the three that never relied on ads and commercial assistance from software providers by Ickie's persistence of insisting on being a community funded site. Even though SOH was number three in users and traffic I believe the real heart and soul of the Flight Sim Community lived here.

Ickie gave everything he had to SOH and stands tall as our provider and deserves his place as a leader in Flight Simulation.

On a personal note, Ickie was a good friend, a good person and someone I always looked up to for the 19 years I have known him. I'll miss him and never forget our long talks and our friendship. I love you Buddy!

Vaya con dios mi Amigo

CK,

Thank you for the history; that means a lot and we appreciate all you have contributed over the years to help get us here. We, like you, will miss him a lot.

[stovall]

Fantastic tribute to Ron, knowing his history with all here confirms how important "Ickie" was to all of the administrators. I will miss his advice and direction. He was always there for me.

[Motormouse]

Ron had an amazing learning curve.

It was a non-stop uphill endeavor for him to keep abreast of technology and the required effort to keep this web site running smoothly, twenty four-seven. It was fascinating to read his accounts of DoS attacks, software buggery, hardware burnout, etc, etc, etc.....

And he'd always come up with solutions, many of them exceptionally creative. And fast. And calm. And the website carried on with it's public availability.....with hardly ever a hiccup. If you'd blink, you'd miss it. That's how switched on he was.

Calmly ahead of the curve, always, and regardless of anything else. What focus.

Beyond that, Ickie was also a remarkably patient man.

Back around the year 2001, we started a written brawl in this forum. It began as a rebuttal of a bully who was having a public beat-up on a virtual airplane modeler (these pages), and quickly went dynamite into the social-political off-topic. It was essentially a bar room style brawl that carried on non-stop for about five years.

Certainly Ickie had something to say about all the furniture we were busting up, but in fact, he demonstrated an extraordinary amount of restraint, an amazingly light touch. The litany of enraged complaints he received on a daily basis must have been deafening.

Whatever personal opinions he harboured, and may have even confided to close associates, in fact he showed no sign of bias online, save the quiet desire to preserve some reasonable protocol, and perhaps that we bust fewer tables and chairs so that others might actually come here to share their enjoyment of flight simulation.

After the dust finally settled, the man quietly wrote some changes to prevent any furtherance of such conflict, and allowed a close association with an independant and heavily padded discussion room that can be found at the bottom of the forum list here.

Effective, on the ball, non-partisan and fair beyond expectation. Vastly intelligent, vastly talented, and as patient as Buddha.

It has been, is now, and shall forever be, a certainty.

WE will all miss you, Ron Larson.

You had a powerful effect, Sir, in your disarmingly quite manner.

Thank you, Ickie.

Thank you.

That has to be best eulogy for Ron (Ickie) that I have read, magoo.

ttfn

Pete

[sixstrings5859]

A great tribute to a great man. RIP Regards,Scott

[CH_OldZeke]

Figgued I'd checkin and I see the announcement on the main page.
RIP Ickie.