Frank Entry Cook

Frank was born in Everett, Washington, USA, in 1917 and he knew tragedy from an early age. His father died when he was two, leaving his widowed, Swedish grandfather to make a home for Frank?s mother, Frank, and his sister, Elinor, who was two years his senior. Here the little family lived until Frank was 12. These formative years had a great influence on Frank, as Grandpa Lindstrom was a caring old man who dispensed love and discipline, lessons that Frank never forgot. In 1929 Frank?s mother remarried and the family moved to a house of their own.

The hardworking and adventurous life that was to become Frank Cook?s normal existence started in childhood. At eight years old he delivered magazines house-to-house before school; from ten years old Frank and his cousin worked a 5 am to 7 pm day on visits to his uncle?s dairy farm. Aged ten years, Frank rode some thousand miles, almost as far as Chicago, illegally in a freight train, and at fourteen his summer holiday was spent as cabin boy on a cargo ship which journeyed to China and Japan.

In 1935 Frank?s formal education continued at the University of Washington, where his love of sport, which had started ...[more]

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h track events, baseball and football at Queen Ann High School, culminated in rowing. In his freshman year the eight-oar crew, of which he was a member, competed on the Hudson River, New York State, and were victorious over all other University teams. Two years into a University business course Frank decided that there was little future for him in a financially depressed economy. With characteristic breadth of vision and daring he trained and entered for the 52-mile heel-to-toe walk around Lake Washington. His placing of second earned him enough money from wagers to finance a voyage to South America and the next phase of his life.

From 1939 to 1964 Frank worked in Brazil: for three years as a Company Auditor for Singer Sewing Machine Company, for five years with Sterling Drug Company as General Sales Manager, and then for Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company 3M where he became General Marketing and Sales Manager for Brazil. This was followed with two years in South Africa and four years in Minnesota as Director of International Marketing of retail and industrial tapes world-wide.

Then, wearying of corporate life, Frank left 3M and separated from his first wife, Lucy. He worked in the Far East, rejoined 3M and left again to discover, love, and live in the southern tip of Portugal, the Algarve.

In 1969 the first of ?The Traveler?s Paradise? books on Portugal were compiled, marketed, and published by Frank. This was a journal that was started when the Algarve was virtually undiscovered by tourism and was updated and published annually for twenty-six years. The Algarve publication was joined by editions on Lisbon, the North of Portugal, and Madera, all in English, Portuguese, French, German, and Spanish. The pocket-sized guides had considerable impact and three and a half million copies were sold. In 1996 the Silver Medal of merit for outstanding contribution to Portuguese tourism was awarded to Frank at a ceremony in Oporto, northern Portugal, in the presence of many Portuguese government and national dignitaries.

The final chapter of this incredible adventure finishes in England, with France and Florida also featured and my part in the story beginning.

In 1969 I was on holiday in Faro, Algarve, and was introduced to Frank, a resident, by a mutual friend. Together we mused over the rough notes for his very first publication. Two years later we were married, in Reno with a civil ceremony and Indian blessing, and Frank and I settled in the UK. For many years Frank traveled monthly into Portugal to continue with his guide publications, and he also added two London journals, ?Strolling through London? and ?The London Theatre Scene,? immensely enjoying his considerable knowledge of the capital city.

From the beginning of our marriage my own career became inextricably bound up with Frank. It was his breadth of business knowledge, personal wisdom, and sound financial guidance that helped build my Dance College from a comparatively small establishment to the centre of excellence for dance and theatre performance that it is today.

To do justice to the extraordinary life of Frank Entry Cook is a formidable task; this is but a brief outline. Some of the photographs reflect places Frank knew so well: Portugal, of course, France, the English countryside and London, and finally Sarasota, Florida, where we spent a wonderful, happy last winter.

Frank Cook was a man who had been everywhere and done everything and had lived a full and not always easy life. Perhaps because of this, he was a man at ease within his own self, quiet, dignified, tolerant, and a natural gentleman, with a genuine interest in other people?all people, their interest, and their lives. Frank was a wonderful husband to me; a dashing and sophisticated companion, thoughtful and kind, and always supportive of my career. He was as positive facing death as he was in life, and so many of us are richer for knowing him.

Doreen J. Cook