Frank Houde made a major transformation of his life philosophy and world view, moving from gung-ho Cold War aviator in the U.S. Air Force, to a warrior for peace who marched, demonstrated and spoke out against the atrocities of war.

Lt. Col. Frank Lawton Houde, of Albany, a retired Vietnam War pilot who later served as president of the Albany Tom Paine chapter for Veterans for Peace, at the 2021 Veterans Day Parade in Albany. He died June 20 at 89.

ALBANY — Frank Houde, an Air Force pilot in the Vietnam War, whose deep re-examination of his place in the moral universe led him to become a warrior for peace, died on June 20 at Daughters of Sarah Nursing Home after a long illness. He was 89.

A strongly built master carpenter and craftsman of traditional wooden boats, Houde had battled through two bouts of COVID-19, hemorrhagic stroke, broken hip and dementia.

On Father’s Day, after he lost his ability to speak, his wife of 43 years, Connie Frisbee Houde, spooned him ice cream and “he grinned just like a little kid.”

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Lt. Col. Frank Lawton Houde went into the wild blue yonder on the summer solstice, the longest day of the year. “Of all the days, I thought that was auspicious for his passing,” his wife said. It was a final transition for a man who had made an about-face of his core values and guiding philosophy.

After retiring from a 20-year Air Force career that included flying B-47 intercontinental bombers for the U.S. Strategic Air Command as a gung-ho Cold War aviator, Houde recalibrated his life’s mission. Houde’s second act came after participating in a 1991 workshop titled “Healing the Wounds of War” at the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck with the late Thich Nhat Hanh. The Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk, poet and peace activist who rose to global prominence for his opposition to the Vietnam War and as the “father of mindfulness” and engaged Buddhism.

Houde took to heart Hanh’s message that........

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