Phillip John Kelsey, 78, of Lancaster, SC and Danbury, CT, died on August 7, 2019. Born August 12, 1940 to Royal Winston Kelsey and Alice Roberts Kelsey in San Jose, CA, he was a graduate of San Jose State University.
Phil served in The Vietnam War with the 1st Cavalry Division in the US Army in 1966-67. He received medals including The Bronze Star.
Phil is survived by his wife of 26 years, Susan Dumville Kelsey. He is also survived by his daughter Jeanne Kelsey Fritchley (her husband Brian Fritchley and son Jake Fritchley), his daughter Kimberly Kelsey (her daughter Harlow Kelsey), his previous wife Dolores Marcotte Kelsey, his step-son Sander Romanski, and his sister Patricia Kelsey Parker and brother Royal W.Kelsey Jr.
Phil had a lifelong love of flying as a private pilot, instructor and air charter pilot. In 1988 Phil cofounded Reliant Air Charter, with his partner Wayne Toher, after a career with The Kendall Company and Colgate-Palmolive. He had almost 20,000 flight hours and the FAA awarded him the Master Pilot designation in 2015.
Phil was an avid skier, scuba diver, fisherman and loved target shooting on his farm in SC. He was unflappable under duress.
He was a loving Husband, Father and Grandfather.
A celebration of life will be held at Green Funeral Home in Danbury, CT on August 11th from 3:00 - 6:00 pm. Interment at a Veterans National Cemetery will occur at a later date.
Donations may be made to Tunnel to Towers Foundation (tunnel2towers.org) or Samaritan’s Purse (samaritanspurse.org) in his memory.
