In Memoriam
Richard Roskos
Richard Roskos
1964 Yale graduation
January 2, 2026
On this date we were notified by Yale that Richard Roskos ’64 had passed away on November 27, 2025. Below are the following remembrances:
Obituary
The Dallas Morning News
December 28, 2025
Richard Roskos
in recent years
Stephen Richard Roskos died in his sleep on Thanksgiving, November 27, 2025 after a seven-month-long fight through complications of a heart attack. He was 83 years old. Born on October 12, 1942 to parents Stephen Luther Roskos and Florence Eleanor Roskos in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Richard devoted his life to the service of others through psychiatry. He attended Yale as an undergraduate and attended University of Minnesota Medical School in 1964, where he also studied classical and flamenco guitar and met the love of his life, Dale Lang. He served at Fort Riley in 1971 and compassionately treated Vietnam veterans.
After residency at the Menninger Foundation, Dr. Roskos joined their staff for a decade, then moved to Dallas in 1981. He was a psychiatrist for over 50 years and served as the medical director at Green Oaks and later in Denton at University Behavioral Health. He was associate professor of psychiatry at Texas A&M where he taught medical students.
Dr. Roskos's perseverance, dedication, and loyalty left a lasting impact not only on the lives of his patients but also on those who knew him personally. Known by some as the "Gentle Giant" (height 6'4), he was a favorite among patients and colleagues. His patients said he saved many lives.
Richard Roskos was preceded in death by his beloved wife of 54 years Dale. He is deeply mourned by his daughters Dr. Ingrid Roskos and Nicole Roskos, their spouses Thomas West and Theo Schikowitz, his grandchildren Katelyn (24), Carson (22), Addison (19), and Indio (10), his sister Caroline Roskos, brothers Alan Roskos and James Roskos, his sisters-in-law Stephanie Goldsmith, Pam Lang, Brenda Roskos, and Laurie B Stevenson; and his brother-in-law Hewitt Lang.
Essay, 60th Reunion Book
by Richard Roskos
May 2024
Conceived in Queens, NY and the first child of a Norwegian mother from North Dakota and Slovakian father from Pennsylvania, I was born shortly after my mother’s train ride to Minneapolis. Due to World War II, my father was absent much of my first year.
I excelled as student, athlete, Boy Scout, baritone horn player, and of course, paper boy. Ultimately, I earned eight athletic letters in high school: football (we were state champs several times), co-captain of the basketball team, and shot-putter and discus thrower. I became Eagle Scout. Also, I was president of my National Honor Society.
Yale recruiters came to school. I applied and was accepted, though without a scholarship. We couldn’t afford those Ivy League prices, so the University of Minnesota would be fine. However, my German teacher, Fraulein Snabbi, got on my case and said, “No way Richard,” demanding that I contact Yale graduates. Surprisingly, I got a partial scholarship from General Mills! Hence, the first part of my American Dream became real.
Yale began when I walked into my room on the old campus and met Ben Day. We frequently traveled to see his father, Reverend Day, of Christ Church in Hyde Park. He was instrumental in Martin Luther King, Jr’s. honorary degree awarded during our graduation ceremony. I made the freshman basketball team; it was great for me and I am sure that Dick Derby’s passing ability made me look good by knowing the sweet spot for my jump shot. Sadly, he died in a car crash during his early Yale years. I decided to major in Pre-Med and German Literature.
I spent my junior year abroad in Munich. When the ship MS Rotterdam left port, I remember my mother shedding tears. Arriving in Amsterdam, of course we looked at the red-light district before embarking on a Rhine River excursion, seeing many castles and cathedrals along the route to Germany. It was one of the best decisions of my life — a boy from Robbinsdale exposed to culture in all its forms — with a BMW motorcycle to boot. Riding to the south of Rome and then east to Greece, I ultimately traveled back to Munich through Communist Yugoslavia.
Returning to Yale, I became involved in the marching band. My rugby team played against an Irish team in Central Park, NYC, where the 30-year-old guys took us apart. Also, with John Ashcroft as our quarterback, our Branford football team beat the Harvard Eliot House team on November 22, 1963. On the way to the game, we heard JFK had been shot, but didn’t know that he had died until after our victory.
My life after Yale has been a great journey:
- Attended University of Minnesota Medical School, 1964–1968.
- Studied classical and flamenco guitar, joined a flamenco dance troupe.
- Met the love of my life Dale Lang, a beautiful Jewish woman from Far Rockaway. Married at Tavern on the Green (also the location of 50th wedding anniversary)
- Interned at Lenox Hill Hospital (NYC).
- Began the Menninger Clinic psychiatry program in Topeka, the “Mecca of Psychiatry.”
- Drafted into the army at Fort Riley (1971–1973), treated Vietnam veterans.
- Joined the Menninger Clinic staff where after ten years I received a call out of the blue from a fellow US Army major who lured me to work in the never-set-foot-upon State of Texas.
- Moved to Dallas with our two grade-school daughters Ingrid and Nicole, and dog Brandy.
- Worked as a psychoanalytic psychiatrist, my wife Dale as a child psychologist.
- Noted as “The Doctors Roskos.” Ingrid became an OB/GYN, Nicole and Dale have achieved doctorates.
- Practice psychiatry currently in Denton; also a clinical professor of psychiatry for Texas A&M, where I teach medical students.
- Mourning my wife’s sudden death in July 2023. We had a wonderful life together.
My American Dream — I went to Yale and married Dale.
Essay, 50th Reunion Book
by Richard Roskos
May 2014
We have our memories, fantasies, and personal myths. I set foot on the grounds of Yale only once in the past fifty years, yet in my mind I have always been a Yalie. Those formative four years set me straight in a way, and altered my path. A second-generation descendant of an immigrant Slovakian coal miner and Norwegian farm families, I entered the freshman commons full of pride and uncertainty, but certain of my place in family lore as the first Ivy Leaguer. In high school I excelled at most everything, as most of us did, and was fortunate to attend Yale. During freshman year I soon realized that I wasn’t nearly the best even at what was my best. Quite a reality check! My freshman roomie Ben Day helped settle me down a bit, being familiar with the east-coast intellectual scene.
Opportunities soon opened. Imagine that in four years I participated in multiple sports: freshman basketball team (making the team only because of the passing ability of Dick Derby who could always get the ball to me at my sweet spot), rugby, and Branford College football, crew, and basketball teams. Most salient memory was winning the Yale/Harvard intramural football game against Eliot House, with John Ashcroft as our QB, learning on the bus to the game that JFK had been shot, not knowing until later of his tragic death.
Other musings are frat parties at DKE, playing baritone horn on the Yale Marching Band, weekend dates with coeds from the Seven Sisters (ranging from sublime to dreadful), the frozen walk to science classes on the hill with Per Wickstrom, and experiencing Ray Charles up close and personal. Best class by far was Art History taught by Vincent Scully, though I did also enjoy a whole semester of Goethe’s Faust, line by line. Majoring in German Literature, of all things, allowed me to spend my junior year abroad in Munich, with a two-month semester break riding my BMW throughout Italy, Greece, communist Yugoslavia, and back. Plus skiing every weekend, mountain climbing the Zugspitze, and entering East Berlin at Checkpoint Charlie.
Memories have been kindled by this personal essay, of my friends and classmates, teammates, professors, and sadly by learning of those departed, most of whom are still young men planted in my mind. Yale shaped my life: my choice of a gratifying career as a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, my intellectual bent. Of course many a time I have traded on the cred of being a Yalie.
But now back to my personal myth. In the very recent past I discovered I was NOT the first Yalie in my family line. Ironically, during my freshman year I read The Theory of the Leisure Class, unbeknownst to me written by my great great uncle, Thorstein Veblen (Ph.D.,Yale, 1884). Additionally, his nephew Oswald Veblen, a graduate of Harvard, was a noted mathematics professor at Princeton for many years. Some Norwegian farm boys, I do say!