He earned his BA with highest honors from Williams College in 1925 and went on to study painting for three years at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.

He joined the Detroit Institute of Arts in 1930 as educational secretary, gained a promotion to assistant director in 1933, and worked as director from 1945 to 1962, growing the museum's American art collection into one of the top five in the country according to the Detroit Free Press.

[4] In 1968, Richardson received the James Smithson Medal, the Smithsonian Institution's self-described "most prestigious and highest award.

"[5] Other honors included Chevalier of the French Legion of Honour, Chevalier of the Belgian Order of Leopold, and honorary degrees from Union College, Université Laval, the University of Delaware, the University of Pennsylvania, Wayne State University, and Williams College, A Benjamin Franklin Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, Richardson also belonged to the American Philosophical Society, the Century Association, the Franklin Inn Club of Philadelphia, and Phi Beta Kappa.

[2][4] Detroit Free Press lauded him as "the dean of American art historians throughout the country," a "shy and scholarly director, much more comfortable doing research than at social gatherings.