Douglas Tompkins

Doug Tompkins
Tompkins in 2009
Born
Douglas Rainsford Tompkins

(1943-03-20)March 20, 1943
DiedDecember 8, 2015(2015-12-08) (aged 72)
Coyhaique, Chile
Occupation(s)businessman, conservationist
Known forNorth Face, Esprit, Tompkins Conservation
Spouses
(m. 1964; div. 1989)
(m. 1993)
Children2[2]
AwardsNew Species Award, Good Steward Award, David R. Brower Award
Websitewww.tompkinsconservation.org

Douglas Rainsford Tompkins (March 20, 1943 – December 8, 2015) was an American businessman, conservationist, outdoorsman, philanthropist, filmmaker, and agriculturalist. He founded the North Face Inc, co-founded Esprit and various environmental groups, including the Foundation for Deep Ecology and Tompkins Conservation.[3]

Beginning in the mid-1960s, he and Susie Tompkins Buell (née Russell), his first wife, co-founded and ran two companies: the outdoor equipment and clothing company The North Face and the Esprit clothing company. Following their divorce and Tompkins' departure from the business world in 1989, he became active in environmental and land conservation causes. In the 1990s Tompkins and his second wife, Kris McDivitt Tompkins bought and conserved more than 2 million acres (810,000 ha) of wilderness in Chile, exceeding that of any other private individuals in the region, thus becoming among the largest private land-owners in the world.[4] The Tompkinses were focused on park creation, wildlife recovery, ecological agriculture, and activism, with the goal of saving biodiversity.

He had assembled and preserved the land which became the largest gift of private land to any South American government.[5] Due to this, he was posthumously naturalized Chilean.[6]

  1. ^ Pearson, Stephanie (December 9, 2015). "Obituary: Doug Tompkins (1943-2015)". Outside magazine. Archived from the original on February 7, 2017. Retrieved December 11, 2015.
  2. ^ Abrams, Rachel; Southall, Ashley (December 9, 2015). "Douglas Tompkins, 72, Founder of North Face, Dies in Kayak Accident". The New York Times. p. B14. Archived from the original on August 1, 2019. Retrieved December 9, 2015.
  3. ^ "This idea proved less wild than it first appeared". Australian Financial Review. September 22, 2021. Archived from the original on January 26, 2023. Retrieved January 26, 2023.
  4. ^ “Pleistocene Park” emerges from Patagonia's rescued grasslands Archived February 28, 2010, at the Wayback Machine, nationalgeographic, January 23, 2010
  5. ^ Franklin, Jonathan (March 19, 2017). "Chile's new 'route of parks' aims to save the wild beauty of Patagonia". The Guardian. Archived from the original on July 19, 2019. Retrieved March 19, 2017.
  6. ^ "Nacionalidad por gracia: Comisión revoca por unanimidad reconocimiento al cardenal Ezzati" (in Spanish). January 7, 2019. Archived from the original on January 8, 2019. Retrieved September 9, 2020.