Wessel began his high school years at Hamilton Catholic where he was a tackle on the football team. However, around 1938 the family moved to Oxford and Wessel transferred to Stewart High School.
He excelled at Stewart and during his time there participated in the debate team, fine arts club, and Hi-Y Club, while also winning honors in current events contest. Along with his academics and extracurriculars, Wessel played catcher on the school’s baseball team and guard on the basketball team.
Graduating from Stewart with the class of 1940, Wessel went on to Miami University, pledging to Phi Kappa Tau in his freshman year. He was still at Miami when he was selected for service in World War II, being inducted into the U.S. Army on Oct. 10, 1942.
Assigned to the 83rd Infantry “Thunderbolt” Division at Camp Atterbury, Indiana, Wessel deployment to England in April 1944. The Thunderbolts landed at Omaha Beach two weeks after D-Day and headed into the hedgerow fighting of Normandy’s Bocage.
A section chief with the rank of staff sergeant, Wessel commanded an M2A1 105mm Howitzer and its crew as part of Headquarters Battery, 908th Field Artillery Battalion. Wessel directed his gun in combat action in all five campaigns of the European Theater of Operations: Normandy, Northern France, the Rhineland, the Ardennes, and Central Europe.
At the conclusion of the war he was awarded a Bronze Star Medal, with the citation partially reading, “he performed his duties in a highly commendable and exemplary manner, often working under hazardous conditions due to the tactical situation.”
Following his discharge from the Army, he returned to Hamilton where he lived with his parents and returned to his studies. Following in his father’s footsteps, Wessel graduated from Cincinnati’s Salmon P. Chase Law School on June 5, 1951.
Law was the family business, and the following year his father was elected Hamilton Municipal Court Judge, serving until 1966. Richard was the Butler County Prosecutor 1965-1973.
Wessel married Helen Jewel (Brinker) Wessel on June 30, 1951 in the rectory of St. Ann Catholic Church. At the time Wessel was working as the personnel manager for Columbia Machinery & Engineering Corporation, a position he had started while still working on his law degree.
Leaving Columbia, Wessel joined his father and brother in opening Wessel, Wessel, & Wessel Law Office, located in the Rentschler Building. Critical to Wessel’s story, he and Helen moved to a new subdivision in Fairfield Township in 1953, residing in a ranch house at 666 Shady Lane where they raised their only child David Brinker-Wessel.
Hamilton for many years had felt the strain of being confined to their corporation limits while continuing to grow. This resulted in a string of annexations that incorporated into Hamilton a large chunk of lower Lindenwald. In 1947, Hamilton proposed annexing the entirety of Fairfield Township, but gave up on the plan when it encountered backlash from township residents.
With Hamilton devising additional annexation plans, it became clear to the residents of the growing suburban areas of the township that the only way to avoid becoming part of the city was to incorporate themselves.
Thus followed a series of opposing plans and proposals for incorporating various portions of Fairfield Township, all of which included the township school, American Cyanamid, and Fisher-Body within their bounds.
Wessel headed the Fairfield Residents Committee in initially supporting a plan devised by Warren Steele to incorporate the entire township with the slogan “Keep Fairfield Fairfield.” With the rejection of Steele’s plan in April 1954, Wessel’s group shifted support to another plan devised by Walter Hunter which was ultimately accepted.
The Village of Fairfield was born on Aug. 1, 1954 following a vote by residents within the Hunter Plan’s geographic bounds. The new village needed a mayor, and Wessel threw his hat in the right, running against Steele and William Holden.
Wessel won the election and became Fairfield’s first mayor, though he jokingly referred to Helen as the real, “City Hall.”
With nearly no funds and having only a single employee and one dump truck at his disposal, running municipal government was quite the task for Wessel. With the voluntary help of local farmers he personally cleared snow from roadways and repaired potholes while, with the help of village solicitor Carl Kollstedt, defended Fairfield in court on nearly a weekly basis.
A 1955 population count confirmed Fairfield’s as having over 5,000 residents, granting it city status. Wessel was chosen to continue as mayor in a write-in election that followed and would hold the position until 1957.
During his three year period as mayor, Wessel worked to secure a meeting place for Fairfield’s government, stood up the Fairfield Police and Fire Departments, presided over the mayor’s court, helped create the Civil Service and Planning Commissions, and headed efforts to construct water and gas utilities.
Even after losing his reelection bid, Wessel remained involved with the city and returned to serve as the city solicitor 1966-1975. In 1977, Wessel took a case to the Ohio Supreme Court which resulted in Fairfield being permitted to levy a tax to support its municipal recreational facilities. That same year he helped guide the city’s acquisition of the Pleasant Run Golf Course, now Fairfield South Trace Golf Course.
In addition to their public activities, he and Helen were charter members of the Fairfield Civitan Club, were involved with the Fairfield Historical Society and Knights of Columbus, and supported the Fairfield Community Foundation. The Wessels were instrumental in the reservation and restoration of the Elisha Morgan Mansion. In 2002, Wessel wrote a book detailing Fairfield’s founding entitled, “Fairfield at Creation.”
Wessel maintained his law practice in Hamilton until Sept. 30, 2011. He died just over four months later on Feb. 5, 2012, at age 89, and is buried in Greenwood Cemetery. Helen passed on Sept. 24 of the same year.
Brad Spurlock is the manager of the Smith Library of Regional History and Cummins Local History Room, Lane Libraries. A certified archivist, Brad has over a decade of experience working with local history, maintaining archival collections and collaborating on community history projects.
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