Lasting Memories

Ledger D. Free, Jr.
Dec. 24, 1921-April 5, 2015
Menlo Park, California

Ledger D. Free, Jr., 93, of Menlo Park, CA, died at home on Easter morning, April 5, 2015, of congestive heart failure. He will be remembered as a man of great energy and integrity, and as a loving, dedicated father and husband, who put family above all else. Ledger was born on Christmas Eve, 1921, in Casper, WY, the eldest son of the late Ledger Daniel and Clara Belle (Williams) Free.

He served in Europe in the U.S. Army Medical Corps from 1941 to 1945. Ledger graduated from Harvard College in 1947, in the class of 1948. He graduated from Stanford University School of Law in 1950. He was recalled for service in the Korean conflict and served in the U.S. Army Air Force in Tacoma, WA, from 1951 to 1953.

While in Cambridge at Harvard, Ledger met Carol Brennan Fox, and they were married on June 18, 1948, in Quincy, MA. Ledge and Carol moved to San Carlos, where they raised their children until Carol?s untimely death in 1962.

In 1954, Ledger joined the legal department of the Bank of America in San Francisco. In 1966 he joined The Burke Company and rose to become Chairman, president and CEO. He negotiated its sale in December 1986 and served on a number of company boards over the next decade.

In 1965, Ledger met Dottie. He and Dorothy Ann Clark married on November 12, 1966, in San Francisco. They enjoyed 48 years of a very happy, full and loving marriage.

Ledger was a trustee on the Bay Area Hospital Planning Commission; president of the San Carlos Elementary School Board, and a trustee for the United Way Bay Area Crusade and served on its budget committee.

Ledger served as president of the Harvard Club of San Francisco and in several regional and national roles for the alumni association. In 2005, Ledger received the Harvard Alumni Association Award.

Ledger will be missed deeply by his family and friends for his humor, his intelligence, his vitality and energy, and his love of family and country.

Ledger is survived by his wife, Dottie, his brother Edward, his three children, Karen Free Royce of Greenwich, CT, Doug (Elaine) of Mountain View, CA, and Ken (Angela) of San Francisco, his four grandchildren David Brown (Lori), Wesley Royce, Patrick and Sylvan, his great grandson Ezra Fox Brown and several nieces and nephews. His brother Robert predeceased him.