Obituaries

Gordon Hendee Price

Gordon Hendee Price, a well-known residential designer in the Orient area and a former New York advertising executive, died Sunday, June 8, after a brief illness. Mr. Price was 90 years of age and had been a resident of Westport, Mass. since 2009. 

He was a very active member of the community and a participant in the Westport Art Group and Bridge Club. Mr. Price deeply appreciated and loved the many close friends he made there.

TBorn in New York City, Mr. Price grew up in Bronxville, attended Bronxville schools and graduated with the class of 1942. He was the son of Chester Boyce Price, well-known New York architect and architectural renderer, and Alice Hendee Price, a nationally recognized portrait painter. Gordon Price was a past president of the Board of Directors of Gramatan Townhouses. He was a former member of the Art Directors Club of New York and the Illustrators Club of New York.

As an executive art director and vice-president of Dancer Fitzgerald Sample Advertising in New York City, he served such major accounts as Toyota, General Mills, Life Savers and Brown Forman Distillers. Retiring in 1984, he moved to Orient where he fulfilled a lifelong ambition by incorporating as a residential designer, Art Directions, Inc., and building a successful practice that continued for many years.

Mr. Price was a 1949 graduate of Brown University and in 1951 he also completed degree requirements at Rhode Island School of Design where he majored in illustration. During World War II he enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Corps serving as a radio technician in the U.S., England, France and Germany. He was honorably discharged in 1946 with the rank of sergeant.

He began his career as an illustrator with the advertising art studio of Carlson & Forino. In 1955 he became art director with a small advertising agency in New York City, moving in 1958 to McCann Erickson, where he was hired as an art director. Four years later he joined Dancer Fitzgerald Sample and became an executive art director and vice-president in print and television advertising.

Mr. Price was married to Joan Estelle Rhinehart of Bronxville, N.Y. for 20 years from 1949 to 1969, the marriage ending in divorce. She died in 1977. In 1980 he married Maret Bjornberg of Minneapolis, from whom he was divorced in 1985. He was preceded in death by his beloved long-time companion, Edythe Vaughan Stevenson, who was also a noted writer and advertising executive.

Mr. Price is survived by three sons from his first marriage, Scott R. Price and his wife, Suzanne of Naugatuck, Conn.; Donald H. Price and his wife, Maxine of Port Townsend, Wash.; and Eric W. Price of St. Petersburg, Fla.; three grandchildren, Clare B. Price, Stephen T. Price and Sean M. Price; a stepson, Kyle Emerick of Novato, Calif.; and many nieces and nephews. He was the half-brother of the late Boyce P. Price and brother of the late Barbara P. Farnell.

A memorial service will be held Saturday, July 19, at 11 a.m. at St. Andrew’s by-the-Sea Episcopal Church in Little Compton, RI, followed by burial with military honors in The Union Cemetery and a reception in the church hall. Relatives and friends are cordially invited to attend. For tributes or directions: www.waring-sullivan.com.

Contributions in his honor may be made to the Westport Art Group, P.O. Box 157, Westport Point, MA 02791.

This is a paid notice.