A Tribute to Rick Hanson

written by Matthew Reed

I was saddened to learn that Rick Hanson, long time TRS-80 Model 100 evangelist and enthusiast, died on April 30, 2011. He was the founder of Club 100, a very important Model 100 user group that began in 1983 and still exists today at club100.org.

Through Club 100, Rick Hanson repaired Model 100’s and provided them to people and groups that needed them, including newspapers and relief organizations. He also sold Model 100 peripherals and became the sole source of many items as the market contracted. He played a vital role in promoting new Model 100 hardware such as the NADSBox, a memory card storage device designed by Ken Pettit, and the REX, a ROM/RAM add-on designed by Stephen Adolph. He also ran the Club 100 BBS until October 2007.

Rick Hanson enjoyed promoting the Model 100, and was featured many times in newspaper articles. He also made a memorable August 2001 appearance on Leo Laporte’s television show on the TechTV channel where he demonstrated the durability of a Model 100 by dropping it to the ground without damage. He also later appeared on Laporte’s radio show in March 2008.

He was one of the friendliest people around in the computer world and he will be greatly missed.

Categories: General

Comments

Arthur Kaufman says:

I enjoyed communicating with Rick for years who kindly repaired my 100’s and 200’s which I still use. I also sent him an article on my 200 but I don’t know if it was circulated around the Tandy Club. I tried contacting his e mail address after he died but so far have not had any reply. I think I may have persuaded a number of people to try and buy a 100 or 200 (I live in Sheffield, England, UK.

I particularly enjoyed his sending me copies of the fantastic car he built and suggested he show it around Europe, am sure he would have walked off with all the prizes.

If you know anyone near me who is interested or still uses 100 or 200’s I would not mind hearing from them. I also have a working WP 2 and external floppy drives for these machines.

All the best for the New Year ….. Arthur Kaufman (known to Rick as Arthur K)