HARLEY BALDWIN 1945 - 2005

Harley Baldwin Harley was an Air Force brat often rumored to be heir to the Baldwin Piano fortune. Harley had a reputation, among those who didn’t know him very well, for being a tough business man and rather stingy with his time and his money.

In truth he was a soft touch and his generosity was the stuff of stories that will live for many generations. He just had an infuriating tendency to name-drop that gave him an aura of snobbism. It did put me off on many occasions, and I would leave the room feeling "less than" for not knowing of what he spake AND not wanting to admit it to him. I always attributed this annoyance to his need for approval.

At his core, Harley cared desperately about every living thing. I remember catching him with tears in his eyes, deep in a canyon on a camping trip to Lake Powell in 1970. There was a snowy egret perched high above us. It had reminded H.B. of the egret that had died when he and I both had jobs feeding the animals at the Syracuse Zoo during college.