On his seventy-fifth birthday, one of my father’s television stations taped a tribute to him from three rather distinguished associates. The first was Paul Harvey, who said, “Roy, I kind of invited myself to your birthday party because you for so long have been such a credit to our sometimes incredible industry. Others may do what you’ve done over the years yet to be, but you always have been first and they, only because they were encouraged by a pioneer who has moved on the mountain alone, then to beckon us more timid ones to follow. Roy, as the politicians say, I want to wish you many happy returns and on behalf of our industry, may I plead with you, sir, to lead on. Good Day.”
Next came a salute from William S. Paley, founder and former chairman, CBS, Inc., saying, “As a broadcaster, as a businessman, as a family man and friend, you continue to show a boundless enthusiasm that the years cannot give. In a career filled with remarkable achievements, you have earned a place in the history books as the first broadcaster to acquire the full limit of seven television stations, seven AM radio stations, and seven FM radio stations. To these broadcast properties and your other business and perpetual interest you have brought an enlightened leadership and dedication. I congratulate you on your successes, past, present and future, and wish you all the best. Happy seventy-fifth Birthday, Roy, from all of us at CBS.”
Finally, Allen H. Neuharth, former CEO of Gannett Co., Inc., said, “Nothing could be more worthy of a celebration than seventy-five years of Roy Park. And as we think about that up here in Washington, and envy you leading in Carolina, I want you to know, Roy, that even after seventy-five years, those of us who have been watching you are well aware of what the next seventy-five are likely to be with your company. I know you and Dick Gilbert and others are down there plotting about how you are going to take over the Gannett Company and move the whole thing to Ithaca, and we are ready to talk with you about that anytime you are because we admire you and envy you for all you have done, and for everything I know you are going to do in the future.”
Neuharth also said, “Park has several other outstanding characteristics. He’s a real entrepreneur in the very best spirit. He’s also a great patriot. He has combined that patriotism and entrepreneurship in a way that has benefited not only his own business but the communities, the institutions he’s served, his state and the nation. Not only the high and mighty have nice things to say about Roy Park.”
Another Park associate was the vice chancellor for development and university relations at North Carolina State University. Like any aggressive college, NC State pays attention to its wealthiest graduates, both for their influence and for what might be earmarked for the college in their wills.
Rudy Pate was enthusiastic in his praise of Park’s role in helping the university. He was quoted as saying, “He’s been an enormous influence,” Pate said, adding that Park played a leading role in developing more corporate support for the university. “Mr. Park is also the hardest working man I know,” Pate said. “He’s got an enormous capacity for work. He has already been recognized as one of the most successful corporate executives in the twentieth century.”
Past NC State Chancellor Larry Monteith had said, “Roy has added to the great strengths and excellence of all functions of the University…he was an advisor to four chancellors, a leader and was prominent in advancing his alma mater.”
It was Park’s philanthropic endeavors and dedication to North Carolina citizens that prompted the late NC Senator Sam J. Ervin to say, “He is one of the finest human beings the good Lord ever created…and he has one of the most important characteristics of all—an understanding heart.”
“I’ve never seen anyone who works like Roy Park works,” said James J. Whalen, president of Ithaca College. “When you’re leaving, Roy Park is working. When you come back, Roy Park is working. He has tremendous energy, tremendous drive.”
In 1985, when Whalen awarded him an honorary degree, he said, “Yours is the greatness of the self-made man who has made of himself more than most men dare to attempt.”
Former NC State Chancellor, Joab L. Thomas, said, “Roy Park’s life has been characterized by a high degree of integrity, motivation, and discipline, a trait finely honed by a demanding regimen in the busy realms of advertising, newspaper, radio, television, and corporate leadership. Nothing escapes his attention or his interest. A voracious reader, world traveler and philanthropist, his thoughts and actions encompass the world.”
And Bill Friday, president of The University of North Carolina System, who had known Park for twenty years, summed up the Ithacan and his success this way: “He remembers the small things. He knows the little things make the big things come.”
To Sam Ervin, there was nothing offensive about Park’s interest in profitability. “I don’t know that it’s any cardinal sin to try and make money,” Ervin said, “I don’t think everybody’s afflicted with that desire.” Pops had many articles written about him in the Ithaca Journal. In 1991, Helen Mundell wrote an article headlined, how park enraptured a small city.
“He’s a very acquisitive man,” said Betty Boniface, when she was secretary to Park Communication’s president, Wright Thomas. “One of his mottos is, ‘We never sell anything.’ Someone once asked him what he did for fun. He said he worked, because he just loved running his company.”
His own secretary, Barbara Iorio, when she was working for him said, “I really enjoy working with him because it’s been like getting a master’s degree without paying the tuition.”
“He’s a marvelous person,” commented Sandy Kuntz, owner of Hal’s Deli in downtown Ithaca. She was a longtime renter in a building owned by Pops, where he and his top aides frequently ate lunch. “He’s done so much for the community.” Kuntz was thrilled when Park constructed a new building near her Ithaca Aurora Street eatery, to replace the burned-out Leonardo Hotel. Kuntz loves that Park patronized her deli, “when there are so many fancier places he could eat.” And what did Roy order? “Chopped liver or a pastrami or corned beef sandwich,” Kuntz said. She added that “He liked our kosher dill pickles—and coleslaw.”
Park had a great influence on the career of another great eatery owner, former Ithacan Forrest Smith, who grew up playing with Park’s children and calling Park “Uncle Roy.” “Roy Park,” Smith said, “taught me to enjoy the other person’s success, as opposed to begrudging them their successes.” Park also told Smith to pay attention to detail, told him that he loves the Bible, and that the most important thing in his business life is to teach people to learn to love what they do. The last thing Park taught Smith is that everybody needs a role model, Smith said. “He’s mine, and I’ve got the best.”
In other comments reported by Mundell, Fred Weeman, vice president, First Albany Corporation, said: “He’s one of the true long-term investors. The only time I’ve ever seen him part with a stock is when he’s made a gift.” Randel Stair, his financial vice president, said, “I learned very early on that while he was willing to listen to anything you wanted to comment on or propose, you’d better have your homework done.”
Once Anthony DiGiacomo, retired president of the First National Bank said, “I’ve known Mr. Park well over thirty years. He’s a stickler for detail. If he makes a promise to you, he keeps it—a rare quality and a good quality,” and Harry F. Byrd, Jr., former U.S. Senator from Virginia, said, “I regard him as…a great businessman, a splendid newspaperman, and overall, just a very superior person.”
My father and mother’s best long-term friends, Charles and Doris Smith, were also quoted. Chuck, who was a family member and an official with Ithaca Gun when my father helped him negotiate his sale, said, “I first met Roy right after I came back from World War II, in about 1946. Then…[along] came Duncan Hines. He got hold of Duncan Hines and made him famous.” And Doris Smith said, “He’s been a sincere friend. He was helpful in arranging the financial aspects of the sale of Ithaca Gun. He’s sort of a genius at that.”64