Two years ago, a new relationship brought Toni Delacorte Ladenburg from Washington, D.C., to Stillwater. At the time, she told her brother she wasn't sure the relationship would last -- but that the move would.
"The relationship didn't," said Nils Ladenburg. "But the town did."
Ladenburg died Friday of lung cancer at her Stillwater home. She was 67. Although she lived in Stillwater for only two years, she made many good friends at the end of her life and was deeply involved with helping people achieve and maintain sobriety through Alcoholics Anonymous, he said.
"She melded into this Stillwater community so well," he said. "When she gave you a hug, she meant it. And when she gave you a kick in the pants, you deserved it."
Ladenburg was born Toni Delacorte in St. Louis. After attending Cornell University, she moved to San Francisco, where she started a career in communications by joining Greenpeace's fledgling Save The Whales campaign to stop the commercial killing of whales.
"She started that with no money," Ladenburg said. "They got to the point where they got enough to send an entourage to fly to Japan to meet with the government. She did that on a shoestring."
She continued to work for "underdog" organizations, charities and animal protection groups, he said. She also was a lifelong lover of golden retrievers, and always adopted dogs that needed rescuing, he said. In fact, her first company in San Francisco was called "Delacorte and Dog."
Ladenburg later became press secretary for Tom Hayden during his run for the U.S. Senate, and when he was married to Jane Fonda. She also worked for George McGovern's 1972 presidential campaign in California.
