Kingston, 9 September 2021 – The Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, the Honourable Olivia Grange, says the tragic death of Richard Salm has come as a real shock to her because, “apart from everything else, he was my good friend.”

Mr. Salm died in hospital after being involved in a motor vehicle accident on the Llandovery main road in St Ann, yesterday, September 8.

Minister Grange said, “He would visit with me quite often during which time we would talk about his sports programmes and his tourism activities.”

She noted that he emigrated to Jamaica from England at age 26 and became a naturalised Jamaican.

“Deeply committed to sports, he led on the formation of the Jamaica Ski Federation, which he headed as President and his son represented Jamaica at the World Championship in 1999.

He brought skier Errol Kerr to me and with our support Errol represented Jamaica very well at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada, placing ninth out of 32 competitors.

Richard was also involved in tennis, squash, cricket, rugby and boxing. He started a tennis programme at his hotel, Club Caribbean, that produced Jamaican champions in virtually every age group.

Also in another of his magnanimous gestures, Richard donated 30 acres of his Drax Hall property in St Ann for a community sports complex.

For his signal contributions to sports and tourism in Jamaica, the Government was pleased to award him the Order of Distinction in the Rank of Commander (CD) in 2019, for service to Tourism, Winter Sports Promotion and Community Development.

We will always remember Richard Salm, who adopted Jamaica as his home and showed unstinting love for the country by all that he did to assist the development of tourism and sports. And we still had so much unfinished business.

I extend my deepest sympathy to his family, relatives, friends and associates.

You more than earned the right to be regarded as a ‘son of the soil’. Rest in peace, my friend, Richard Salm, I will certainly miss you; Jamaica will miss you."

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