Notes for Samuel Richards SIXBEY
Samuel Sixbey, 80, aerospace engineer Samuel Richards Sixbey of 108 Spring Valley Road, a former Perkin-Elmer engineer who worked on major space projects, died Friday, Jan. 18, at Danbury Hospital. He was 80 years old and the husband of Elsie Anderson Sixbey. He was born June 1, 1921 to Sarah Richards Sixbey and Carlton Buck Sixbey in Mayville, N.Y. He was the youngest of six children and valedictorian of his high school graduating class. Mr. Sixbey spent nearly four years in the Army during World War II in the Signal Corps. He served in both the European theater and the Pacific islands. He left at the conclusion of the war in 1946 as a staff sergeant. Mr. Sixbey attended Alfred University and Brooklyn Polytechnical Institute, where he graduated with a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering in 1949. He began his family in Long Island, N.Y., where he worked as an electrical engineer for Servoc Corporation for 11 years. In August 1960, Mr. Sixbey moved his family to Ridgefield and began a long career with Perkin-Elmer Corporation, where he worked as an optical and aerospace engineer and an optical physicist. Mr. Sixbey was well known for his pioneering design work on scanning devices for the newspaper industry and for currencies. He worked on the lunar landing project, specifically on soft landing techniques. He pioneered work on lasers, early inkjet printers, servos, and fiber optics. He worked on many projects for NASA. He spent the last 10 years of his professional career on the Hubble space telescope. Mr. Sixbey retired from Perkin-Elmer in 1985 as a principal engineer. He was listed in Who’s Who in Engineering in New England. He was president of the Connecticut Branch of The Optical Society of America for two years. He was an honorary member of the Ridgefield Men’s Club and a member of the National Engineering Honor Society. Mr. Sixbey was an avid amateur photographer all of his life. He enjoyed gardening, cooking, classical music and puttering around his Ridgefield home for 41 years. For many years he was assistant scoutmaster and troop committee chairman of Boy Scout Troop 49 of Ridgefield. “He was most happy when with his family,” a family spokesman said. “Mr. Sixbey valued and loved his family and they valued and loved him. He led a long, interesting, full and beautiful life.” Besides his wife of 56 years, his survivors include four sons: Peter of Metlaketla, Alaska, Michael of Oxnard, Calif., Lawrence of Ridgefield, and Alexander of Danbury; one sister: Marietta Sixbey of West Hills, Calif.; eight grandchildren, two great-grandchildren and many nieces and nephews. Services were Tuesday at the Jesse Lee Memorial United Methodist Church. Burial will be in the spring at Ridgebury Cemetery. Contributions in Mr. Sixbey’s memory may be made to Covenant House, 460 W. 41st Street, New York, NY 10036.
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