Richard Otto Wiegand was born on September 20, 1948, and grew up on the Wiegand Farm in the Town of Centerville in Manitowoc County, Wisconsin. The Wiegand farm has been in the family since 1848. Richard operated the farm in the 1980s. Local and family history were common topics at the dinner table. Richard started doing family research in his 30s and has never stopped. That research included trips to Germany in 1987 and 2003.

The author attained three degrees in Dairy Science (BS, MS, PhD) from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in addition to an MA in African Studies from Ohio University. He was employed by University of Wisconsin-Madison Division of Extension in Northwest Wisconsin from 2004 until he retired in 2017. He has done considerable international work, serving with the US Peace Corps in Kenya and Paraguay, conducting graduate research in Ethiopia and consulting with the African Development Bank in Ivory Coast.

Richard was a co-founder of Centreville Settlement, Inc. in 1982, a Centerville historic preservation group and served as President, Vice President, and Board Member. He was also a co-founder of The Greater Centerville Historians that collected Centerville oral history from 2000-2015. Richard is the author of Silos of Manitowoc County (1989), a popular monograph for the Manitowoc County Historical Society. He has been a member the Manitowoc County Historical Society, the Sheboygan County Historical Society and Sheboygan County Historical Research Center for over 30 years, and recently became a member of the Max Kade German Institute in Madison, Wisconsin. In addition to his books, Richard has written numerous magazine articles, educational presentations, reports and grants.