Ray Tye, 87, chairman emeritus of United Liquors; was one of Boston’s biggest philanthropists
Hoodoo
By Bryan Marquard
Globe Staff / March 11, 2010
http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2010/03/11/ray_tye_life_saving_philanthropist_dead_at_87/
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Ray Tye saw charity as his life's work.
Ray Tye was one of Boston’s biggest philanthropists, but he didn’t much
care for the title, and he was even less interested in drawing public
attention to his private donations.
The chairman emeritus of United Liquors, who died of cancer in his
Cambridge home yesterday at 87, gave away millions, often covering the
medical expenses of people described in news stories as unable to afford
life-saving care.
“He always did this quietly,’’ said his wife, Eileen. “He never wanted
his name chiseled into a hospital facade or put on a plaque.’’
And he agreed to be the public face of the Ray Tye Medical Aid
Foundation, established in his honor by his wife and friends, only
because it might prompt others to contribute to the good will he saw as
his life’s work.
“Ray Tye was a great Bostonian and an even greater source of
inspiration,’’ Mayor Thomas M. Menino said in a statement yesterday. “He
did so much for so many, always offering help to those that needed it
the most. His legacy of helping children have a better life no matter
what the circumstance — whether they were from young people in Roxbury
to kids in Afghanistan — will not be forgotten. Ray cannot be replaced,
but we can honor him by helping those in need. He always ended every
conversation with, ‘What can I do for you?’ ’’
Among those who sought Mr. Tye’s assistance was Dr. Larry Ronan of
Massachusetts General Hospital, whose patients included Rakan Hassan, a
12-year-old boy accidentally shot by US troops in Iraq and critically
injured in 2005. Mr. Tye paid the cost of bringing him to Boston for
treatment.
Doctors turn to Boston’s wealthiest when such cases arise, and Mr. Tye
“certainly had to be the king of those people,’’ Ronan said.
“His generosity was one of spirit, not just of pocketbook,’’ Ronan said.
“It wasn’t just a charity for him; it had to be a relationship, and
that’s unique. He was deeply involved in the cases. He wanted to know
about the patients and make sure their families were taken care of
properly. And he would come to the hospital. He knew how to comfort
people.’’
While many philanthropists prefer to work through intermediaries, Mr.
Tye’s approach was disarmingly personal.
“With Ray, there was no bureaucracy or paperwork,’’ Ronan said. “I never
filled out any paperwork for the Ray Tye Medical Aid Foundation to get
funds — nothing.’’
Thus when a stray bullet killed 10-year-old Trina Persad in Dorchester
in 2002, Mr. Tye quietly stepped in to pay for her funeral. And when he
read that conjoined twins from Egypt were preparing to leave the United
States because no money was available for surgery to separate them, he
wrote a check for $100,000 the next day.
“They were going to be sent home to die,’’ Mr. Tye told the Globe in
2007, a few years after the surgery that saved the boys. “I’m so proud
to be able to say we helped.’’
“Ray Tye never stopped caring,’’ John Fernandez, president and CEO of
Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary, said in a statement. “Thanks to his
generosity, in 2003 a young man from Ecuador who sustained a gunshot
wound to his face received treatment here at Mass Eye and Ear to restore
his ability to eat, drink, and speak. Since then, Mr. Tye enabled more
than 25 patients to receive advanced treatment that they would not have
been able to obtain elsewhere. He used to say, ‘When you save a life,
you save a future.’ Ray Tye saved many futures.’’
Mr. Tye’s money also helped ensure the future of Boston institutions.
Last year, he gave the Boston Public Library, which he served as a
trustee, $27,500 so the main branch at Copley Square would not have to
close its doors for five Sundays in a budget-cutting move. And when the
Boston Celtics could not make payroll in the team’s early years, Mr. Tye
helped his friend Red Auerbach cover that bill, too.
“In the Jewish tradition, we say about someone who has passed away, ‘May
his memory be a blessing,’ ’’ said Barry Shrage, president of Combined
Jewish Philanthropies in Boston. “This man’s presence was a blessing to
the Jewish community and the general community every day of his life.’’
A. Raymond Tye was born in Haverhill, the second of three children. His
father, an immigrant from Kosovo, made shoes, and the family changed its
last name from Tikotsky to Tye at his mother’s behest.
Mr. Tye, who went by the name Ray since childhood, began his charitable
giving when he lived in a three-decker.
“He talked about how they’d go up the back stairs and there would be
little boxes for charity and he’d put change in,’’ said his son Mark of
Aspen, Colo.
Mr. Tye graduated from Haverhill High School and went to what was then
Tufts College, where he was studying to become a social worker.
“I worked my way through a portion of college living in Norfolk House,
which was a settlement house,’’ he told the Boston Herald in 1985.
Children from broken homes came for occupational therapy and recreation,
he recalled in that interview.
World War II intervened, and Mr. Tye joined the Army, serving as a first
lieutenant in the military police and as an adjutant to General George
S. Patton. He was wounded during the war, and after returning home he
worked for his family before taking a job with United Liquors, which
then was a small operation in Boston with three trucks and 30 workers.
Mr. Tye rose from warehouse worker to salesman, sales manager, general
sales manager, and, in 1957, president.
He became chairman emeritus of United Liquors when the company was sold
to the Martignetti family in October 2006.
“An extension of our family was the United Liquors family,’’ said his
son James of Rio de Janeiro. “He never said no to anybody.’’
If a worker was sick or had an ill relative, he said, Mr. Tye would
arrange for the best medical care and often cover the cost of treatment.
A natural extension was helping those outside his families at home and
at work.
“I said to him, ‘Ray, you did become a social worker; your goals have
been met,’ ’’ his wife said.
“He did everything without any publicity or any acknowledgement,’’ Ronan
said. “That wasn’t important to him. What was important was that the
patients got taken care of.’’
Mr. Tye was awarded an honorary doctorate from St. Joseph’s College in
Standish, Maine. And in 1994, the 50th anniversary of the college class
Mr. Tye left to serve in the Army, Tufts awarded him a bachelor of arts
degree.
His first marriage, to Rosalyne Burg, ended in divorce. Their son
Michael, a winemaker who also worked for United Liquors, died in 2003 of
multiple myeloma.
For about a decade, he was chairman of Boston’s Water and Sewer
Commission. A life member of the NAACP, Mr. Tye served on the boards of
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston Medical Center, Schepens
Eye Research Institute, and Tufts Medical Center.
Mr. Tye married Eileen O’Toole 21 years ago, and a couple of years
before his 80th birthday, she wanted to do “something that would keep
his generous heart and his generous helping hands open to future
generations.’’ Seeking assistance and $2 million in financial
contributions from family and friends, she created the Ray Tye Medical
Aid Foundation as an 80th birthday present.
“My philosophy,’’ Mr. Tye told the Herald in 1985, “is what you take out
of this world you put back in.’’
“He really changed the world, and there’s not a lot of people you can
say that about,’’ said his son Mark. “He really did change the world.’’
In addition to his wife and two sons, Mr. Tye leaves two children from
his first marriage, his daughters Carol Rose of Lakewood, Colo., and
Randy O’Brien of North Easton; a stepdaughter, Lauren Cronin of
Wellesley; and five grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. Monday in Congregation
Mishkan Teflia in Chestnut Hill. Burial will be in Children of Israel
Cemetery in Haverhill.
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