John Van Devanter, one of the two founding publishers of the Vashon-Maury Island Beachcomber, died on Nov. 1, 2007.

Van Devanter was born Aug. 1, 1926, and he and his brother Bob moved to the Island in 1931 at the ages of 5 and 7, respectively. Their father had tuberculosis and was in a sanitarium for 12 years, so their care was assumed by their grandmother and three great-aunts in the family home in Burton.

In 1943, Van Devanter lied about his age and enlisted in the Navy. He did very well in school, in part because all four of his caregivers — his grandmother and great-aunts — were teachers, and graduated from the University of Washington in 1949. with a degree in journalism. He was a member of the academic honor society Phi Beta Kappa there.

Van Devanter, Carl Nelson and their wives started The Beachcomber on a shoestring budget. The paper’s first edition was published on March 7, 1957.

“I remember friends and neighbors used to come to the office in the middle of the night and fold the newspapers by hand,” said Van Devanter’s daughter Susan Puz. “It was very much a community effort in those days.”

Puz said she remembered sleeping on stacks of newsprint in The Beachcomber office while her parents “put the paper to bed” and her father’s “Getting the Drift” columns.

“He won at least three awards for them and was honored by his fellow publishers,” she said. “I often hear from old-timers that they miss the column and his history with the Island.”

Van Devanter’s son Russ Van Devanter said The Beachcomber was a popular source of local information for Islanders.

“There was no other way to get information,” he said. “At the time, it was a pretty close-knit paper, and it had a nice mixture of gossip and intrigue.”

Van Devanter sold his share of the paper in 1965 and went on to found The Pierce County Herald that same year. He later started The Scanner, a labor newspaper. For the last 15 years of his career, he was a union negotiator for the bus drivers, cooks, janitors and secretaries at public schools in the Olympic Peninsula.

Van Devanter was a volunteer ambulance driver for Vashon Island Fire & Rescue. He was active in Drama Dock for more than 20 years.

He was an avid gardener and arborist. He restored the family home, a 1900s-era landmark on the neck of the Burton peninsula.

According to Russ Van Devanter, his father moved off Vashon to Cashmere, Wash., eight years ago when upkeep of the Burton home became too much.

“He left a very nice legacy of sharp focus on the community, and he and Carl Nelson did an excellent job of serving the community,” said Islander Jay Becker, who served as publisher of The Beachcomber several management changes after Van Devanter.

Van Devanter is survived by his wife Nancy, his daughter Susan Puz of Lamona, Wash., his sons Russ Van Devanter of Seattle, Dr. Dutch Van Devanter of Edgewood, Wash. and Mike Cannata of Saranac, Minn., 13 grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren.

His ashes will be buried next to his daughter Gina Jones in a private family ceremony at the Vashon Cemetery this spring.