Born: 10/16/1870   Union City
Died: 1938
Parents: Frank D. Newberry, Fannie E. Newberry
Spouse: Bertha Buttsky
Address(es):
Last known
Carmel , CA

Image	Title	Genre	Audience	Publisher	Date
	The House Boat Mystery	Fiction	Children	New York : Frederick A. Stokes Co.	1936
	Forward Ho! a Story of the Argonne	Fiction	Children	New York : Frederick A. Stokes Co.	1927
	Who is This Man? - With Alice MacGowan	Fiction	Children	New York : Frederick A. Stokes Co.	1927
	The Seventh Passenger - With Alice MacGowan	Fiction	Children	New York : Frederick A. Stokes Co.	1926
	Shaken Down - With Alice MacGowan	Fiction	Children	New York : Frederick A. Stokes Co.	1925
	The Mystery Woman - With Alice MacGowan	Fiction	Children	New York : Frederick A. Stokes Co.	1924
	A Million-Dollar Suitcase - With Alice MacGowan	Fiction	Children	New York : Frederick A. Stokes Co.	1922
	Black Boulder Claim	Fiction	Children	Philadelphia, PA : Penn Pub. Co.	1921
	Castaway Island	Fiction	Children	Philadelphia : Penn Publishing	1917
	Tom Westlake's Golden Luck : A Story of Adventure in California	Fiction	Children	Chicago: M. A. Donohue & Co.	1913
	- Other boys' serials, novelettes, short stories	Fiction	Children

What is the aim or goal of your writing: On Sir-Cuss Day, in 1923, Perry Newberry was featured as the one-man band, playing among other things a variety of horns, buckets and saws. As artist, playwright, musician, dancer, actor, producer, director, designer and carpenter of Carmel cottages, author of children's stories and mysteries, city trustee, mayor, editor and co-publisher of the Carmel Pine Cone, he was indeed a one-man band for Carmel. Born in Union City, Michigan, in 1870, he early turned to engraving as a trade, but left that to turn to printing in Chicago, and for the years 1887 to 1897 he was a real estate agent in Chicago. In 1897, he and his wife Bertha (Buttsky) came to San Francisco, where Perry worked for the San Francisco Examiner and the Post. He also worked for the San Jose Sketch, sometimes with a gun on his desk, so contentious were the politics of that era. Perry and Bertha came to Carmel in 1910 by stage coach, and Perry almost immediately became involved with the Forest Theater Society and witnessed the sole performance of David, the first production of the Forest Theater. He went on to become actor, producer, playwright and general dogsbody for that organization. Carmel accepted Perry as one of their own almost immediately and he became an instant Carmelite. He identified himself with the "art element," which was anti-progress, as opposed to the "business element," which favored development and progress that would have meant turning Carmel into a carbon copy of every other small town. He was both an environmentalist and a conservationist. As such, he opposed the paving of Main Street, a cause which he ultimately lost, but he won against the developers who wanted to build a large resort hotel at the foot of Ocean Ave. In 1922 he was elected to the Carmel Board of Trustees and, because he won the largest number of votes, became the mayor. His campaign literature proclaimed: "Don't vote for Perry Newberry," and went on to explain that if you favored progress, development, large houses or money making, he was not your man. He soon retired because of the press of business, but in 1927 became the editor and co-publisher of the Carmel Pine Cone, which served as a platform for his radical views. He denounced the proposed direct route from the 17 Mile Drive through the Carmel Gate to San Antonio Street and Highway 1. In 1929 he again successfully ran for City Trustee, and thus, mayor, on a similar anti-progress platform. His friend, city attorney Argyll Campbell, reflected Perry's views in Ordinance 96, which defined Carmel as primarily "a residential city." Similarly, Campbell wrote zoning ordinances which limited the size of the business district and restricted the size of houses in the residential district. Perry Newberry was not successful with everything he undertook. The houses which he built for himself and others leaked, and the chimneys did not draw properly. But, as one owner said, "At least, they didn't fall down." Because he had been gassed during World War I, his health was not always the best. In later years, he worked in an old chair, wearing a blue bathrobe and woolly slippers, with a dish filled with hand-rolled cigarette butts nearby. Although he despised pretension, when he appeared in public he always wore a long black scarf and his hair was long and flowing. He died in December, 1938, much mourned by Carmelites. Samuel G. Blythe wrote in the Pine Cone, "Perry Newberry was Carmel. The real Carmel never would have come to its present beauty, character, atmosphere and unique distinction, intellectual cultural and physical without his guidance, vision and courage. Now that he is dead, Carmel will do well to remember and maintain his precepts and practices, his wisdom and his vision, lest some other inferior kind of a Carmel, as it surely will, takes the place of the present beloved village--a common Carmel--a conventional Carmel--a dull, deadly commercial Carmel." (December 9, 1938)

May inquiries be sent to you about doing workshops, readings: No

Donated books to the Authors & Illustrators database project: No

Skills:
Author

MeLCat Links:
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Last Modified On: 9/20/2015 12:00:00 AM