Former Greenville High basketball coach Bob Fagley, Acadian Companies Chairman & CEO Richard Zuschlag, Elaine Zuschlag
On Saturday, October 8, the Greenville Area School District Educational Foundation held its second annual Distinguished Hall of Fame induction ceremony. Acadian Companies Chairman & CEO Richard Zuschlag was one of five alumni inducted into the hall of fame. The other inductees include Dr. Matthew Landfried, James M. Loutzenhiser, Mary K. Miller, and Dr. Robert Baker. This is the second class of inductees.
Zuschlag is a 1966 graduate of Greenville High School in Pennsylvania. His years at the school, as well as some of his teachers, paved the path for his career that led him to Louisiana and found Acadian Ambulance. One of those teachers, 91-year-old Bob Fagley, was in attendance at the ceremony.
Zuschlag thanked the teachers in the audience and from his time in school, saying in his remarks, “I want to personally thank Coach Fagley for taking an interest in me so many years ago. As the basketball coach, he knew that I didn’t have much athletic ability. When he saw that I felt left out, he asked me to be the team statistician and put me in charge of setting up the PA system for the National Anthem. One day, the PA announcer didn’t show up, so Coach Fagley asked me to fill in. I was scared to death but he had confidence in me.”
That experience sparked Zuschlag’s interest in broadcasting and electronics. “Coach helped me get a job at a radio station in Greenville and encouraged me to pursue a degree in electrical engineering.”
While he was working as an engineer at Westinghouse in the late 1960s, Zuschlag was assigned to a position in Lafayette, Louisiana. After that assignment was completed, he decided to remain in Louisiana, where he and two partners formed Acadian Ambulance Service.
“Coach Fagley’s interest in helping me so long ago played a crucial role in my career, and his legacy continues with every patient we transport. That’s the impact a teacher can have,” Zuschlag said. “Without Coach Fagley, I would have never become an engineer and gotten a job with Westinghouse. I would have never moved to Louisiana, and I wouldn’t have been put in an ideal position to create Acadian Ambulance Service. Today, Acadian Companies has seven divisions, and Acadian Ambulance transports more than 800,000 patients per year. We help thousands of people and save countless lives.”
After the ceremony, several GASD teachers in the audience thanked Zuschlag for helping them realize the effect they can have on a student’s life.
“Too often the contributions teachers make in our society are overlooked and underappreciated. Teachers do so much more than educate our children. They play an integral role in shaping their foundations and their futures,” he said.
