Robert Olden Sr., 92, former deputy to Nassau County exec, dies

Robert Olden Sr., a retired educator who made a second career as deputy to Nassau County Executive Thomas Gulotta and helped lead Nassau Community College past a series of woes, has died.

Olden, a longtime Roosevelt resident, died in his sleep on Sept. 30, his family said. He was 92.

He had faced challenges with a level head and a ready smile — along with what he felt was the hand of God — that paved the way for a diverse career, those who knew him said. In the early days of the Civil Rights Movement, a time when it was a challenge for Black service members to get promoted, Olden was elevated to a captain in the Air Force by the time he left in 1958 after less than three years. He then rose from shop teacher to assistant principal at a Queens high school, retiring in 1987 to go into government.

Olden was Hempstead Town’s deputy commissioner for economic development when Gulotta hired him in 1988 as a deputy county executive to oversee social services, affirmative action and economic opportunities. The job lasted 12 years.

“He just loved the idea of serving people,” said Margaret Olden, his second wife.

Life of service

Born in Sumter, Georgia, Robert Olden was still a baby, the second of what would be five children, when his family moved to Coney Island.

He learned in childhood the service-oriented themes that guided him for life — education and faith, said his daughter, Barbara Olden Gortman of Roosevelt. His parents emphasized education as the way to get ahead and made sure they could send their children to college. His grandmother took Olden and his siblings to church every Saturday to clean it for Sunday, when they’d attend services.

“Standards were high and he was a high achiever,” said his daughter, who recalled the summertime school worksheets her father made for his children. “He wanted the best for anybody, not just his children but people in the community.”

Olden graduated with a teaching degree in 1955 from Maryland State College but joined the Air Force because he wanted to fly, said his son, James Olden of Bonaire, Georgia.

Robert Olden was the navigator, bombardier and reconnaissance officer on planes that flew for hours over the United States as part of the nation’s security system, his family said. During his travels, he faced racism, and in a story he would tell schoolchildren during classroom visits, his flight crew left a restaurant when the proprietor refused to let him in, those who knew Olden said.

After the military, Olden worked as an assistant principal for 30 years at Springfield Gardens High School, in what was then a predominantly white community in Queens. But the students liked him, even though he was “different,” his wife said.

Nassau Community College trustee

While working at the high school, Olden also served as a trustee for Nassau Community College. He was the new board president in 1982 when NCC hired Sean Fanelli as college president — just as adjunct professors went on strike. It was the latest morale buster at the college, where the previous president was among several officials indicted in a corruption and nepotism scandal.

“What impressed me was he was very calm and said, ‘We’ll get through this,’ ” Fanelli recalled. “He was a leader.”

Olden volunteered for decades as a member of the Nassau County police auxiliary and as a leader at Jackson Memorial AME Zion Church in Hempstead, where he was the superintendent of Sunday school.

One of the few Black committeemen in the Nassau Republican Party during the 1980s, Olden told his future county boss that he would continue to “see everyone, regardless of what they look like or smell like,” according to a 1992 New York Times article about him. He spoke at church in the community about county programs, and he took an economic downturn in stride when the county cut its workforce and services he championed.

He trusted God would help him handle things, Margaret Olden said, so even as his memory waned in later years, he remembered his favorite hymn: “ ‘To God Be the Glory’ was his main song … for the things that he’s done,” she said. “He sang the song everywhere he went.”

Robert Olden was predeceased in 2016 by his first wife, Evelyn, his childhood sweetheart.

Along with his wife, Margaret, and his daughter and son, Olden also is survived by his brother, Robert Olden Jr. of Accokeek, Maryland, and stepdaughter, Katrina Nelson of North Carolina.

Visiting hours are scheduled from 5 to 7 p.m. Thursday at Jackson Memorial AME Zion Church in Hempstead, followed by a funeral. The funeral cortège leaves at 9:30 a.m. Friday from the Carl Burnett Funeral Home in Hempstead to head for Calverton National Cemetery.