PC: Evert (left) and Norma Person outside the Sonoma County Museum Friday afternoon.9/23/2003: B1: Evert and Norma Person also helped build the 475-seat Evert B. Person Theatre at Sonoma State University and established a $3 million endowment.

Former PD publisher, philanthropist dies

GAYE LEBARON AND GUY KOVNER
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Evert Bertil Person, Sonoma County's foremost philanthropist and former publisher of The Press Democrat, died Tuesday at his winter home in the Palm Springs area of Riverside County. He was 96.

Person, who retired from the newspaper business in 1985, had been in failing health for a month and died of complications from pneumonia.

Through two charitable foundations and on his own, Person donated about $40 million to the community. Among the major beneficiaries were the city of Santa Rosa, Sonoma State University, Sonoma County Museum, Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital and the Burbank Center for the Arts .

"He wanted to give back to the community," said his wife, Norma Person, because of his conviction that "the success of the newspaper really came from the people in our area."

Person's Scandinavian genes may have contributed to his longevity, as friends often said that that he "looked about 80," she said.

Her husband's response, Norma Person said, was: "You mean I look that old?"

Evert Person, along with financier Henry Trione and the late developer Hugh Codding, are three of the most prominent leaders in Santa Rosa's post-World War II growth from a small farm town to a city of nearly 168,000.

"We will miss him," said Trione, a close friend who often joined the Persons for domino games at their home in Rancho Mirage. "He had a full life."

Bruce Kyse, publisher of The Press Democrat, described Person as "the last of a generation of independent newspaper publishers around the country and the last living link to the family that created The Press Democrat in the 19th century."

"More importantly, after he sold the newspaper, Evert established a tremendous legacy of community enrichment," Kyse said. "Whether a park, hospital or concert hall, his generosity will endure for the next generation. He was truly a friend of Sonoma County."

Friends and colleagues remembered him for his style, as well as his legendary philanthropy.

"He was one of the last old-time gentlemen," said Ken Blackman, former Santa Rosa city manager. "There was always a big smile on his face, always a firm handshake."

Blackman recalled approaching Person for a donation to get the Finley Park, Community Center and Swim Center project going in 1990 and was astonished when Person's $7 million gift built the whole thing.

"It was an exceedingly generous action on his part," Blackman said.

That was the first of many donations from the Ernest L. and Ruth W. Finley Foundation and the Evert B. and Ruth F. Person Foundation, as well as Evert and Norma Person's own gifts ranging from a few hundred dollars to six figures.

The list includes $5 million for the Sonoma County Museum, a $3 million endowment for the performing arts at Sonoma State University where the performance center is named the Evert Person Theater, $3 million to the Green Music Center, $2 million to Catholic Charities and $2 million to the Humane Society, both for new buildings.

There have been gifts totaling $7 million to Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital, including $5 million for a heart institute named for the Persons, and more than $1 million to The Burbank Center for the Arts and Kid Street Theater.

Person's generosity benefitted the Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, Boys and Girls Club, Canine Companions, Special Olympics, Scottish Rite Child Language Disorder Clinic, Social Advocates for Youth, Santa Rosa's Sixth Street Theater and Ukiah's Grace Hudson Museum, where a room is named in the Persons' honor. He was honored by Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital with the James B. and Billie Keegan Leadership Award in May of 2004.

The Persons "took a personal interest in their philanthropy," said Andrea Learned, vice president of development at Memorial Hospital. "They did this to really make a difference for people," she said. "Not just to have their name on a wall."

Learned recalled that one of Person's most memorable donations came on Sept. 12, 2001, the day after the terrorist attacks had left the nation hurt and confused, when Evert Person asked her to meet him in the hospital parking lot.

He handed Learned an envelope and said, "I thought today was a good day to give this to you." It was a check for $1 million.

A handsome and dapper man with an infectious grin, Person was trained as an engineer but wanted to be an opera singer.

The son of Swedish immigrants, Elida and Emil Person, he grew up in Berkeley and attended public schools and the University of California. Person was a chief planning engineer at Kaiser's Richmond defense plant in the early years of World War II before serving in the Army Corps of Engineers.

Through his interest in music, he met Ruth Finley, a concert pianist and daughter of Ernest Finley, the pioneer Santa Rosa newspaperman who combined the Sonoma Democrat and the Evening Press to create The Press Democrat in 1897.

He and Ruth were married in 1944 and, at the behest of the family, Person learned the publishing business from bottom up, beginning as a bookkeeper - "not very well paid" - he remembered, joking with an interviewer in 2003.

He was named co-publisher, with his mother-in-law, Ruth Woolsey Finley, in 1945. At her death in 1973, Person became the The Press Democrat publisher and president of Finley Broadcasting, the original owner of Radio Station KSRO, which Ernest Finley had begun in 1937 as the first commercial radio station in the North Bay.

He purposefully carried on the tradition his late father-in-law had started, supporting projects he felt were important to the growth and economy of the area, including the 101 Freeway and Warm Springs Dam.

He sold the newspaper in 1985 to The New York Times for an undisclosed amount.

Person retained his interest in music throughout his life, serving as a board member and board president of the Santa Rosa Symphony Association in 1957 and as the first president of the Symphony Foundation in 1970.

In 1957, he served on the search committee that brought Santa Rosa native Corrick Brown home from Vienna to become the orchestra's second conductor, and, in 1981, he and Ruth joined 11 other couples who formed a partnership to buy the bankrupt Christian Life Center for $4.5 million to be converted to the Luther Burbank Center for the Arts.

He was a lifelong member of the Bohemian Club and an active participant, with his fine tenor voice, in the club's theatrical productions.

He and Ruth kept a yacht, a twin-diesel cruiser, in Sausalito and often entertained friends on bay outings. He was a member of the St. Francis Yacht Club, a commodore of the 12th Coast Guard District Auxiliary and a former district and national staff officer of the Coast Guard Auxiliary's Flotilla No. 54.

He was a licensed pilot, with a plane at the Sonoma County Airport

that was called into good use in the 1950s and '60s when Press Democrat photographers needed aerial views of floods, fires or large-scale developments.

After Ruth Finley died in 1985, Evert married Norma Betz, a widow and former elementary school teacher, whom he met when she came to the Santa Rosa Golf and Country Club, where he was a member, to take a golf lesson. Norma's lifelong interest in the welfare of children, as well as his own love of children, has played an important role in decisions the Persons have made about contributions to Sonoma County non-profits.

In recent years they have divided their time between a desert home in Rancho Mirage and their hilltop house in East Santa Rosa.

Person was active in professional organizations and served as president of the California Newspaper Publisher's Association in 1981 as well as president of the Institute of Newspaper Controllers and Finance Officers and the California Newspaper Youth Foundation.

In addition, he was a member of the American Newspaper Publishers Association, the American Society of Newspaper Editors, the International Press Institute, the Society of Professional Journalists, Sigma Delta Chi, and the San Francisco Press Club.

He was also a member of the Commonwealth Club, the Navy League, Scottish Rite, Masonic Lodge, Shriners and Elks, as well as the Santa Rosa Chamber of Commerce, Sonoma County Taxpayers Association, Community Concert Association, San Francisco Spring Opera Association and served as president of the Santa Rosa Rotary Club in 1972.

Person often expressed his pride in what became of The Press Democrat. He liked to say that much of his time as publisher was spent turning down offers for the well-established regional paper.

In 1985, The New York Times "made us an offer we couldn't refuse," he joked in an interview. He steadfastly refused to discuss the selling price, except to say that estimates up to $80 million were "way low."

Person said he accepted the offer readily, with the knowledge that he was leaving the family business - and its employees - in "good hands."

An only child who had no children, Person is survived by his wife. A Catholic funeral Mass will be held for him at a date to be determined.

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