Hugh Bishop Codding came to symbolize the post-World War II building boom that transformed Santa Rosa from a sleepy farm town of 18,000 to a suburban community of more than 160,000.
Doyle Park, Town and Country, Montgomery Village, Coddingtown, Rohnert Park - Codding was a key figure in all of them and more. He was, in fact, a dominant figure in the business and civic life of Sonoma County for more than 60 years.
Of course, Codding - who died today at the age of 92 - was much more than a home builder, shopping center developer, banker, title company owner and philanthropist. His business success came in combination with a flamboyant nature that separated him from the pack.
Codding relished his image as a political maverick, big-game hunter, dealmaker, promoter and even a two-term member of the Santa Rosa City Council.
Codding stories abound, in part because he was so fond of repeating them. But they are hard to resist. This is, after all, the fellow who:
Built a house in less than four hours and a church in five hours and 16 minutes.
Threatened to incorporate Montgomery Village as a separate city because the Santa Rosa City Council, dominated by downtown interests, wouldn't provide him with municipal services. (This wouldn't be the first or last time that he tweaked the noses of the city's old-line establishment.)
Acquired an elephant and let it graze in his front yard, the better to demonstrate his determination to be a Republican candidate for the state Senate.
Sight unseen, purchased an old and unwanted office building in Berkeley, in order to coax State Farm Insurance Co. to move its regional headquarters to Santa Rosa. (Later, Codding would convince State Farm to move again, this time to his property in Rohnert Park).
Codding once wrote a letter to the editor in which he proposed that Mexico cede Baja California to the United States and, in return, the U.S. forgive the debt owed by Mexico. It happened that he enjoyed deep-sea fishing in Mexico.
A few letter writers liked the idea. Others were outraged. As always, Codding loved all the reaction - and only he knew whether he was kidding.
He and his late wife, Nell, were among the wealthy couples whose contributions made possible the Luther Burbank Center for the Arts (now the Wells Fargo Center for the Arts.) The Nellie W. Codding Theater at Spreckels Performing Arts Center in Rohnert Park was established with a $1 million gift from Codding.
Later, he and his wife, Connie, would be counted among the community's most generous benefactors, supporting the 4-H Club, the Earl Baum Center for the Blind, the Santa Rosa Junior College Foundation, the Sonoma County Community Foundation, the Children's Health Network,
Artstart, the Southwest Community Health Clinic, Planned Parenthood, the Blood Bank of the Redwoods, the Green Music Center,
Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital,
the Jewish Community Free Clinic,
the Council on Aging, the Sonoma County Museum, the Boys and Girls Club of Santa Rosa and many other worthy local organizations.
In a business world increasingly dominated by corporations managed by button-downed committees, we are unlikely to see another entrepreneur in the mold of Hugh Codding. He changed the face of Sonoma County, and he did it all in a style that was uniquely Codding.
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