Ward, Mary Paine honored for environmental leadership Ward, Mary Paine honored for environmental leadership (September 04, 2002)

By Marion Softky
Almanac Staff Writer

For more than 30 years, Ward and Mary Paine of Portola Valley have been key but low-key players in the movement that has preserved large swaths of Peninsula hills, Baylands and Coastside as permanent open space for public health and enjoyment.

The Peninsula Conservation Center Foundation -- now Acterra -- the Environmental Volunteers, the Peninsula Open Space Trust, and now Portola Valley's open space acquisition program, have particularly benefited from the Paines' ability to organize, inspire and raise money.

Now Portola Valley will honor Ward and Mary Paine for 30 years of environmental leadership at its Blues & Barbecue community celebration and fundraiser for open space, this Sunday, September 8, from 3:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Town Center.

"Ward has been a regional leader in open space protection," says town historian Nancy Lund. "We've had such a tradition of working for conservation ever since the beginnings of the town."

As chairman of Portola Valley's Open Space Acquisition Advisory Committee, Mr. Paine, an early venture capitalist, has overseen accumulation of almost $3 million to preserve open space in town. Of this money, raised from the utility users tax and private fundraising, the town spent $1.6 million to buy the front three acres of Springdown Equestrian Center on Portola Road, just south of Town Center.

The fund still has almost $1.4 million -- plus what is raised from this year's Blues & Barbecue event -- to use for other purchases.

Mr. Paine gives credit for the fundraising success to the group that put on the first Blues & Barbecue five years ago to raise money to restore the historic schoolhouse, now the town meeting hall; that done, they moved on to raise money for open space. "We didn't raise the money," he says. "A bunch of young women did, and they were dynamos."

Conservation in the blood

Ward and Mary Paine came to conservation by different routes.

Ward Paine grew up in Newton, Massachusetts, attended Exeter Academy, and graduated from Princeton as a mechanical engineer. A stint in the Navy took him to Seattle, Japan and Washington, D.C., where he met Mary when he was attending Intelligence School.

Born in Wyoming, Mary absorbed open space and vistas for her first five years. "Portola Valley has the same vista feel. That's what's appealing," she says.

The daughter of a military family, Mary grew up a nomad during World War II. She attended 29 schools before graduating from National Cathedral School for Girls in Washington. "After the war, we were the first dependents to be sent to war-ravaged Manila," she recalls. "When our ship broke down, we and thousands of soldiers spent 30 days contemplating the vastness of the Pacific Ocean."

Her college career was equally nomadic. After stints in Geneva and Copenhagen, she graduated from Carleton College in Minnesota, and took a job with the National Security Agency in Washington -- where she met Ward. They married in 1959.

After another tour of duty in Japan, the Paines came to Palo Alto in 1960, where Mr. Paine helped a college friend fund a new company. He was the first employee of KRS Electronics, which made tape recording devices with large capacities -- for the time.

In working on funding for the fledgling company, Mr. Paine made a discovery. "Dealing with the capital guys was more fun than being an engineer," he says.

Not long after, Mr. Paine became one of the early venture capitalists long before the term was invented or became a buzzword.

Mr. Paine started out with OSCCO -- Ocean Science Capital Corporation -- which specialized in offshore oil services providing equipment to drilling rigs and such. OSCCO evolved to OSCCO Ventures, and broadened its scope to more general high technology involving computers and semi-conductors. Now, Mr. Paine says, "I'm as fully retired as you can be in the venture capital business."

The Paines lived in Palo Alto for three years, and Atherton for 18, before moving to Portola Valley in 1981. "We wanted to live where the horses lived," says Mrs. Paine, an enthusiastic horsewoman.

30 years of conservation

In the late 1960s, the Paines became involved with Lennie Roberts, Claire Dedrick, and other early leaders in Peninsula conservation. Their role crystallized, as the original Peninsula Conservation Center -- in an old blue-and-green house on Oak Grove Avenue in Menlo Park -- struggled to organize itself as a base to coordinate activities of different conservation groups.

Mrs. Paine remembers the mimeograph in the bathtub as she and Mr. Paine tried to provide structure for the fledgling environmental center. "Ward and I worked to put together a foundation to raise money and create an organization," she says.

At the same time, Mrs. Paine remembers the phone rang constantly with questions about environmental issues. In response, a group within the center decided the center needed an entity to handle educational inquiries.

Mrs. Paine was one of the founding members of Environmental Volunteers, which is celebrating its 30th anniversary of bringing environmental education to children in thousands of Peninsula classrooms.

Also in 1972, the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District was established to buy and manage open space in the mountains and Baylands of Santa Clara County, and later, San Mateo County.

By 1976, it became clear that the MROSD needed a companion entity to raise money and acquire land that was not bound by the rigid restrictions on a government agency. As a private entrepreneur, Mr. Paine signed on with enthusiasm.

In December 1977, the Peninsula Open Space Trust (POST) was born, with Mr. Paine as founding president. Twenty-five years later, POST has preserved more than 45,000 acres of land on the Peninsula from the Bayfront to the Coast.

The purchase of landmark Windy Hill in Portola Valley as a bargain sale in 1981 was POST's first success. "It was a huge donation," says Mr. Paine, who headed the nonprofit land trust for its first 10 years. "In time we sold it to the open space district at a huge discount. But still, it gave us the first of our revolving land fund."

So it was no wonder that 25 years later, Portola Valley turned to Mr. Paine to head its Open Space Acquisition Advisory Committee, nor that the town is honoring Mr. and Mrs. Paine this week.

The Paines have three children, who have grown up in the community, and seven grandchildren. Mrs. Paine has also been active in both conservation and community life. She has worked in conservation with the Junior League and the Woodside-Atherton Garden Club. She has served the community on the first lay board for Woodside Priory, and the first board for the new Phillips Brooks School; she is a senior warden at Christ Church in Portola Valley.

Mr. Paine enjoys rowing, fishing, working with land, bird hunting, and being outside. "Conservation keeps me aware of the 'ground truth' of everyone's life on earth," he says.

As a venture capitalist, Mr. Paine likes to see results. That's why POST and Portola Valley are so satisfying. "You try to do something about open space, and you see the results," he concludes. "That's a great reinforcement."