“When we were raising money for the Y, we’d meet weekly at a funeral home and discuss fundraising and things like that,” said Larry Hollingshead, who knew Amrstrong in the 1970s. “Neil easily out-raised any of us. He could open any door and if there was a good community project out there, he would work on it. That’s just who he was.”
Armstrong, who died Saturday at the age of 82 from complications from heart surgery, lived on a 310-acre farm in Turtlecreek Twp. outside Lebanon in the 1970s and 80s.
Armstrong’s biggest contribution to the area was serving on the board that designed and built the Countryside YMCA in Lebanon.
“He was an engineer’s engineer and he took special interest in how it was built,” said Hollingshead, who served with Armstrong on the committee that oversaw the YMCA’s creation and construction in the mid-70s.
Armstrong and several others traveled to YMCAs around the country, analyzing layouts that worked and didn’t work and bringing that knowledge back to Lebanon, Hollingshead said.
Hollingshead remembered buying a horse trailer from the Armstrongs.
“He gave it a space capsule check-out before we were allowed to drive off with it,”Hollingshead said.
Armstrong famously tried to eschew his image as a hero, content with small town life and his farm.
“He’d come in once or twice a week and sit at the businessman’s table,” said Sandy Fuston, co-owner of the Lebanon Village Ice Cream Parlour.
A copy of an autographed picture of Armstrong hangs in the ice cream parlor’s “Hall of Fame.” Fuston’s mother keeps the original in a safe place, Fuston said.
Turtlcreek Twp. Trustee Jim VanDeGrift coached Neil’s son Mark on Lebanon High School’s football team.
“He never tried to throw his weight around,” VanDeGrift said. “He just wanted to be a parent and a booster.”
VanDeGrift remembered Armstrong as a caring man. VanDeGrift was involved in a serious accident and suffered severe burns on his face and hands.
“Neil came to visit me at my home and he brought me a book about another burn victim, a man he had known,” VanDeGrift said. “I’m going to reread it now because it brings back such fond memories of Neil.”
Neil was an engineer, through and through, even in his leisure time, VanDeGrift said.
“He took a tremendous amount of time analyzing every single golf shot he would make,” VanDeGrift remembered. “We used to tease him about it.”
Harry Wilks of Hamilton became an email correspondant with Armstrong two-to-three years ago after meeting him at a reception for Senator John Glenn.
“We started up a conversation and when it was time to go he handed me a slip of paper that had his email address on it,” Wilks recalled. “I was so surprised because he was known for not being very outgoing by that part. But we talked back and forth.”
Wilks tried to get Armstrong to come to Miami University to be honored, but Armstrong declined the request.
“He didn’t go in for the accolades,” Wilks said.
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