H.G. “Jim” Burns

<p>H.G. “Jim” Burns lost his eyesight as a child, but it didn't stop him from becoming a college instructor, a talented pianist and a cyclist who toured the back roads of Sonoma County into his 90s.</p><p>Burns died Tuesday at his Santa Rosa home after an illness due to cancer. He was 92.</p><p>Both friends and family described him as a gracious and gregarious gentleman, upbeat and eager to encourage young people in their aspirations.</p><p>“He was so engaging,” recalled Laurie Reaume, who played four-hand piano with Burns and did retirement facility concerts with him for 15 years. She noted that she is 40 years his junior, but Burns “was always interested, and genuinely so, in what you had to say.”</p><p>Born June 2, 1918, in Los Angeles, Burns was blinded at age 5 by glaucoma.</p><p>Nonetheless, he went on to earn an undergraduate degree and a master's degree in psychology, from UCLA.</p><p>His family said he persevered to become one of the first blind people to teach at a public college in California.</p><p>“They didn't want a blind person teaching,” said his daughter, Patricia Burns Driedger of Santa Rosa. “They thought it was impossible.</p><p>Burns taught psychology at Los Angeles City College for 30 years. He used students and, at times, his two children as proctors to help grade tests and read students' essays to him.</p><p>“He'd hear every word of what the student wrote,” recalled his son, Gordon Burns of Santa Rosa.</p><p>Burns took up the piano in youth and played it throughout his life. He memorized the parts for his beloved Brahms and other classical pieces. But on the four-hand piano, he simply improvised in various musical keys for such standards as “Ain't Misbehavin',” “Moonglow” and “I'm Beginning to See the Light.”</p><p>He was a seasoned concert goer first for the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra and later the Santa Rosa Symphony. His family said he joined in efforts to encourage aspiring young musicians, including pianist Gloria Cheng, with whom he was able to have lunch last summer when she performed in Mendocino County.</p><p>Burns and his son, former owner of the Bike Peddler store, regularly rode together on a tandem bicycle, including with the Santa Rosa Cycling Club. In 1998 The Press Democrat wrote a story about the two men's regular 25-mile jaunt to Mom's Apple Pie in Forestville, a trip widely known among their friends as the Pie Ride.</p><p>“This wonderful Pie Ride is one of our favorite spins,” Burns told a reporter.</p><p>He took his last Pie Ride in March.</p><p>Burns met his first wife, Dorothea Bannerman Burns, when they were both college students. They married in 1945 and remained so until her death in 1976. Later that year he married Elizabeth Gwynne Burns, who died in 1996.</p><p>Along with his two children, Burns is survived by five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. He is the father-in-law of Superior Court Judge Cerena Wong, who is married to Gordon Burns.</p><p>Memorial services will be 3 p.m. on July 18 at Redeemer Presbyterian Church, 600 Acacia Lane in Santa Rosa.</p><p>The family prefers memorial donations to the Earle Baum Center of the Blind, 4539 Occidental Road, Santa Rosa 95401.</p><p>— Robert Digitale</p>