Don C. Becker

Don Crandall Becker died Friday, January 7th, 2022 at Stamford Hospital in Stamford, Connecticut peacefully in the presence of his immediate family after a prolonged battle with Parkinson’s disease. He was 88 years old. Becker was born on December 31, 1933 in Sacramento, California to his parents Edwin A. Becker and Georgiana English. He later moved to San Francisco and graduated from Lincoln High school in the city’s Sunset district where he was an All City baseball player for the high school team and as a semi-professional player for San Francisco Seals. Becker went on to play professionally in the Pittsburgh Pirates minor league system as a catcher. Simultaneously, Becker attended and graduated from San Jose State University with a degree in Journalism, before enlisting in the US Army and being stationed in Wurzburg, Germany after the Korean War was over from 1954-56. Becker started his career as a journalist with the Santa Cruz Sentinel as a sports reporter for two years before embarking on his career with United Press International’s (UPI) San Francisco Bureau in 1959. Becker was soon assigned to be a foreign correspondent in South East Asia with postings in Singapore and Manila from which he was covering the early days of the Vietnam War (1961-63). Becker later became UPI’s Southeast Asia manager for all operations while based in the Philippines. Becker met his wife of 59 years – Maureen Ann Maguire, the daughter of the Canadian foreign trade commissioner based in Singapore. In 1966, Becker took a brief respite from his journalism career to become the Deputy Commissioner of the inaugural National Professional Soccer league which operated for two (2) years with teams in more than 26 cities and was the predecessor to the NASL. Becker rejoined UPI in 1969 as the Caribbean regional manager based in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Notably, Becker was the first foreign correspondent to interview then Haitian leaders Papa Doc and subsequently his son Baby Doc in exclusive interviews. Becker was then promoted to be UPI’s Florida Manager based in Miami. Becker joined Miami based Knight Ridder Newspapers (KRN) as its Director of Corporate Relations in 1973. KRN fulfilled Becker’s long term objective of being a Publisher in 1977 with his appointment as Publisher of the Gary Post Tribune. In 1979, Becker became President of the Detroit Free Press where he had a very active role in the Detroit business community and served as the chairman of the Detroit Chamber of Commerce in 1984. In 1985, became publisher of another KRN property – The Journal of Commerce. The NY based publication served the Maritime and global insurance industry. Becker made his presence felt in the maritime industry very quickly serving as master of ceremonies of several industry functions including the Admiral of the Oceans awards dinner. Becker was also honored with several industry awards including the Propeller Club’s Man of the Year in 1986, The Connie Award in 1989 and the Seaman’s Church Institute’s Silver Bell award in 1991. Notably, Becker survived the first World Trade Center bombing in February 1993. Becker’s weekly opinion column, which he wrote for over 13 years about global trade issues, was a “must read” for shipping executives. Growth of shipping services like PIERS and TRANSAX under Becker’s leadership made the Journal of Commerce an attractive acquisition target for The Economist which was completed in 1995. Becker retired in September of 1997 at the age of 64. Since his retirement from the Economist, Becker split his time between his homes in Greenwich CT and Los Cabos, MX working on his golf game and putting his journalistic skills to work with the publication of a historical fiction novel called The Bookers: San Francisco Memories in 2007. Becker was Pre-deceased by his younger sister Gayle (2018) and older Brother – Robert (2021). Becker is survived by his wife of 59 years – Maureen, Step Brother – Edwin (Gridley, CA), Brother in Law – Dennis Maguire (Vancouver, BC) Son – James (Grosse Pointe Farms, MI) Son – Brian (Bend, Oregon) Daughter in Law – Mary Anne (Grosse Pointe Farms, MI) Grand Children – Sara (Berkley, CA), Joseph (San Francisco, CA) Reis (San Francisco, CA) and Audrey (Ann Arbor, MI). Private family memorial services will be held at a later date to be determined in San Francisco where his ashes will spread near the Golden Gate Bridge. In lieu of flowers please a leave a donation to the Evans Scholars Foundation in Don's name. https://secure2.convio.net/wgaesf/site/Donation2?df_id=1740&mfc_pref=T&1740.donation=form1 (Please copy and paste the url link) Mortuary services are being provided by the Lacerenza Funeral Home located at 8 Schuyler Avenue in Stamford, CT +1-203-324-0158