While decreasingly active as a consultant over the past 12 years, he regularly provided valuable insight and input into a variety of projects run by McKay Conant Hoover inc, the firm he co-founded (as McKay Conant Brook inc) in 1987 after nearly 30 years with Bolt Beranek Newman.  Ron served in a variety of consulting and management capacities for BBN in the Cambridge, Chicago and Los Angeles offices providing nearly two decades to directing their architectural acoustics activities in western North America.  Born in Chicago on 26 November 1932, after his upbringing in Kansas he earned his Bachelor of Architecture degree at MIT in 1954, extended studies in acoustics as a Fulbright Scholar in Architectural Acoustics at Göttingen University, became a first lieutenant with the Army Corps of Engineers (teaching floating bridges at Ft. Belvoir) then obtained his M. Architecture from M.I.T. in 1958.

From his early days at BBN learning under such notables as Robert Newman and Russell Johnson he gained a reputation as being a competent yet unassuming professional always willing to listen, mentor and collaborate and communicate effectively with other design professionals.  The result culminated in a legacy of scores of exceptional performing arts venues dotted across the USA.  These were accompanied by plaudits from prominent architects, music critics, conductors and musicians alike – including Michael Tilson Thomas and Isaac Stern– notwithstanding his freely admitting to once being fired off a job by Frank Lloyd Wright himself! 

To satisfy both his enduring acoustical curiosity and love of classical music, Ron never missed an opportunity to attend and listen critically to concerts in any important hall he was near.  He would return from venues across the USA, Europe and Asia with contemporaneous notes and share during lively discussions with colleagues at his firm – ever wishing to extend understanding of this field.  In retirement Ron enjoyed multiple and extensive long-distance trips with his wife, Sally.  Such forays included China, Mongolia, Japan, Nepal, Thailand, South America, Eastern and Western Europe and Russia, still seeking out live concerts in notable concert halls. 

Beyond his consulting efforts, Ron taught at the Universities of Illinois, Notre Dame and Southern California and taped an 8-hour television series on architectural acoustics and with textbook supplements for university courses.  He pre­sented before the Acoustical Society of America, American Educational Theatre Association, American Institute of Architects, American Institute of Designers, ASHRAE, the American Symphony Orchestra League, the Audio Engineering Society, the Construction Specifications Institute, the Illuminating Engineering Society, Institute of Environmental Sciences and the U. S. Institute for Theatre Technology.  Many of his 25 major performing arts projects while at MCH earned various Merit and Honor Awards from the American Institute of Architects and the U.S. Institute for Theatre Technology and various Preservation Foundations. He was a Fellow of the Acoustical Society of America and awarded the American Institute of Architects’ prestigious National Honor Award for Collaborative Achievement in 1999. 

Apart from his abundantly kindly spirit, among colleagues, architects and theater consultants he will be remembered and appreciated as among the last consummate collaborators who would sketch clear acoustical concepts in a fine and unique architectural hand that they could readily grasp and neatly fold into their drawings.  Many representative examples of Ron’s work, including insightful discussion will appear in an upcoming acoustical design handbook covering Performance and Instruction Spaces for Music and Dramatic Arts.   Among his highly regarded projects are counted Pasadena’s Ambassador Auditorium, UCLA’s Royce Concert Hall renovation, Zipper Concert Hall at the Colburn School in Los Angeles, Notre Dame’s DeBartolo Center for the Performing Arts and the Mondavi Center for Performing Arts at UC Davis.