Oct. 31, 1929 – Dec. 6, 2024

Edward Lee “Ed” Perkins died in Medford on Dec. 6, 2024, at the age of 95, after a brief period enduring various maladies of old age.

Note: The following obituary was self-written by Ed and titled “Croak Notice.” This should provide an insight to his sense of humor. Ed will certainly be missed. Among his Trust’s beneficiaries are local organizations such as AAUW and Southern Oregon University, as well as Dominican University.

Ed was born on Oct. 31, 1929, in Evanston, Illinois. After living in Evanston three years, his family
moved to nearby Wilmette, where it remained through his university years.

Ed graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Harvard University. At MIT, he was
elected to the Tau Beta Pi engineering honor society. Following graduation, he entered the Air Force, Air
Materiel Command, and although it was during the Korean War, the only foreign country the Air Force
sent him to was Oklahoma, where he was discharged as a First Lieutenant in 1954.

He started his first civilian career at Stanford Research Institute, now SRI International. Initially based in
Menlo Park, California, he transferred to the SRI Southern California Laboratories in South Pasadena,
where he was instrumental in building SRI’s capabilities in aviation and tourism research.

In 1962, he became a co-founding partner in Management and Economics Research, Inc., Menlo Park,
California, which was subsequently acquired by URS, and he left URS to become independent in 1963.
During this period he worked extensively with Gulf South Research Institute, Midwest Research Institute,
and Parsons-Brinckerhoff on a variety of large-scale research projects in aviation, leisure and tourism.

Ed met his wife-to-be and life partner, Eleanore Burchett, in 1963, and they married in 1965. While
continuing their ongoing careers, in 1976, Ed and Eleanore started to publish a travel newsletter,
Economy Traveler. This was a “don’t give up your day job” enterprise, barely breaking even under very
favorable financial assumptions.

That changed dramatically in 1985, when a representative of Consumers Union called, saying that CU was planning to publish a travel newsletter, it liked Economy Traveler’s approach, and it wondered if Ed and Eleanore would be interested in having CU acquire their newsletter. After considering the offer a few microseconds, they agreed, and Ed and Eleanore became founding co-editors of Consumer Reports Travel Letter (CRTL), with its editorial function based in San
Francisco. The publication was extremely successful during their tenure, becoming an important influence in the travel industry. During this time, Ed also started a weekly Consumer Reports on Travel column for distribution by the Chicago Tribune.

Ed and Eleanore retired from CRTL in 1998 and moved to Ashland, Oregon, where they built a comfortable home. While living in this “retirement,” Ed continued his weekly columns for the Tribune and started contributing to several online travel websites, including SmarterTravel, Rail-Guru, Ed on Travel, and FamilyVacationist. Sadly, Eleanore died in 2011, but Ed continued the columns and postings until shortly before he croaked.

Ed and Eleanore had no children and Ed had no siblings. His lack of family was offset by a long line of
great standard poodles and the addition of various progeny of Eleanore’s sister, most notably niece Carmel Windows, of Ashland, and her son, Jacques Gené, of Cool, California, both of whom lived with them over different extended periods.

Ed and Eleanore shared common interests in theater, classical music, opera and, of course, traveling; Ed
pursued his interest in jazz by himself. In Ashland, Ed and Eleanore hosted monthly showings of
musicals and operas under the aegis of the American Association of University Women, showings that Ed
continued after Eleanore’s death.

Ed was not a jock. His interscholastic competitions were in debate, on a high school team that won the
Illinois state championship in 1946 and on a successful team at MIT with partner Jim Jensen, also MIT
1950. He played a lot of golf when in his 20s and 30s, posting a 12 handicap. He could hit a drive 300
yards—once in a while, but with most attempts resulting in tops, slices, and especially duck hooks.

Ed tried to be active with the Oregon/Southern Washington MIT Alumni group, but frequent participation
in activities scheduled in Portland, 285 miles away, proved difficult. Folks from Massachusetts just don’t
get West Coast geography. Meanwhile, Ed was a loyal member of Costco Wholesale, Bi-Mart, AAA, AARP, plus the frequent flyer programs of Air France, Alaska, Delta, and United airlines and the frequent stay programs of Accor, Hilton, Hyatt, and Marriott hotels.

Ed was a lifelong amateur geek, having gained entry status by completing the then-standard rite of passage of building a Williamson amplifier, followed by numerous Heathkits and Dynakits. He was early into personal computers, starting with an Osborne 1 in 1982. His continued devotion to the Osborne’s WordStar keyboard commands into the Windows era earned the frustration of many co-workers at CRTL, but what could they do? Even now, he wrote this using an emulator that makes Microsoft Word think it’s WordStar.

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