While his brother worked in a school in Zimbabwe, Dick Gilman quietly collected money, books and clothes in Connecticut to send to needy students in Africa.
Gilman (58) was in Zimbabwe to help out at the school when he was shot and killed on Monday by border police. The shooting is under investigation.
Gilman was a former middle school teacher who left that job in the 1970s to run his own computer consulting business. He left for Africa last month to help at his brother’s school and arrange to get food to the children, his wife, Mary Gilman, said in Tuesday’s Waterbury Republican-American newspaper. He was supposed to be back in Connecticut by the Thanksgiving holiday on November 28.
In a statement, Mary Gilman said this was her husband’s third trip to Zimbabwe for humanitarian work.
”He was an extremely gentle man, trustworthy and kind,” she said. Longtime friend Art Perret said on Tuesday that Gilman did not like to talk about the humanitarian work he did. ”He did this all on his own, without any fanfare, without anyone knowing about it,” Perret said.
Gilman and Perret were ”hiking buddies” and had discussed Gilman’s trip on a hike last month. Perret said he asked Gilman if he was concerned about the recent violence and uprisings in Zimbabwe.
”He said, ?No, people are very kind down there,”’ Perret said. Zimbabwe police told the newspaper Gilman was shot while trying to flee after arguing with border officers about his passport and travel papers.
Mary Gilman said she found it difficult to believe he argued with an authority figure in a foreign country he loved and had visited before.
”We know that an investigation by the American and the Zimbabwean authorities is ongoing, and we hope that the truth of what actually occurred will be soon discovered,” she said in the statement.
Perret said he also found the police account suspicious. Gilman had traveled by car from South Africa to Zimbabwe before, Perret said, and was accustomed to going through border crossings.
”It would be very uncharacteristic of Dick to run through a blockade,” Perret said. ”He was a guy with a lot of confidence, no fear, but he wasn’t crazy.”
Gilman was an avid traveler and outdoorsman who hiked, kayaked and biked. He once rode a bicycle in New York from Albany to Buffalo, and biked from Torrington to Washington, Perret said. – Sapa-AP