The Tribune

There are men whose lives are remembered because of the high office they held, titles they dined on, money, women or fancy toys they accumulated. Richard ‘Dick’ Coulson’s life mattered not for any of the obvious reasons. Richard Coulson’s life mattered because of what he stood for and what he railed against, a writer and thinker known for his invaluable insight and sage advice that impacted nearly every business and public enterprise in a modern Bahamas. His life mattered to the many people and young start-ups he lent a hand to, quietly and without fanfare, and to those for whom his forensic-worthy analysis and public discourse mapped a way forward. His life mattered to those friends he held close, and to the two daughters and grandchildren who brought such joy to his life.

Lawyer, banker, financial adviser, author, columnist, world traveller, poet, competitive sailor, husband, father, grandfather, romantic, dreamer, Dick never had to hold an elected office to be voted one of the most influential men in Bahamian history. He just was.

Dick died last week after a brief illness. He was 88.

We had lunch only a few weeks before and his e-mails about a topic close to his heart, important for ongoing accountability, inspired him to stay in touch until the last few days. I considered it a privilege to be his friend and, in some ways, confidante, someone to bounce ideas off, review a column for this paper before it ran, think through a sticky issue out loud. I will never know why he trusted my judgment so when he was far savvier than I. In all the decades we have discussed everything from multi-million-dollar deals to poetry, there was only one thing we truly disagreed on, his support for oil exploration. “Forget it,” I implored him, pleading in vain. “I don’t care how much oil is down there. Let it stay right where it is. The risk is too great for the reward. Think renewable, 10 years from now no one is going to be searching for more fossil fuels.”

But one thing about Dickie Coulson, he was as stubborn as a rusted bolt. You couldn’t argue publicly because his hearing challenge would have both of you sounding like hyenas with their tails on fire. So to fight with Dick, you had to do it with the written word, not that you would ever win once he made up his mind about something.

The deal-maker or breaker who probably engineered more IPOs, private placement offerings and partnerships than anyone in Bahamian business history had a softer side that showed itself nowhere more so than when he was around his grandchildren, Emily, 16, and Daisy, 14. He merely had to hear the voices of the two beautiful girls to turn into marshmallow mush. Once when Emily was about 12 and named the Student of the Year at St Andrew’s, Dick called her to apologise that he could not make the ceremony because of an unexpected medical appointment. He waxed eloquently about how proud he was of her, told her she inspired him and he loved her, waxing so eloquently, in fact, that he had to hang up quickly lest she hear the break in his voice and hear the tears he was about to shed. He took the same pride in daughter, Amanda, Director of the National Art Gallery of The Bahamas, and her husband, Ulrich ‘Uli’ Voges, who was like a son to him. With his older daughter, Diana, he took it upon himself to be the first to introduce her to London night life and with granddaughter, Daisy, he showed the best dance moves an octogenarian could make while seated in a car, listening to rap music on the radio that he insisted she keep on so he could give it a try.

Beyond that, Dick (born in Nassau to a Farrington, adopted by Coulson, a British citizen, thanks to Dick’s glamorous mother who split her life between two husbands, managing to keep both entertained and engaged at different times), Dick was a nation-builder, an Andover and Yale graduate who grew up with privilege and in his early life as a rising Wall Street lawyer dabbling in sophisticated financial worlds in sophisticated offices and glamorous parlours from London to Saudi Arabia, he was never a snob, but remained a Bahamian who abhorred racism, ageism, egotism and ethnic rebukes with a passion.

The simplicity with which he wrote his Business Bits column in this paper monthly, making complex issues easy to digest, was mirrored in the way he lived. Dick drove a small, used car, said the best way to get the news was to read it, and preferred the artists’ community of San Miguel de Allende in Mexico or the quiet of Eleuthera for his routine getaways.

For those he allowed to get close enough like the family he cared for deeply, there was so much more to the man. As daughter Diana explains, “Daddy passed between two worlds,” the stuffy Wall Street and London lawyer in pin-stripe suit and a culturally rich Bohemian world his late wife preferred filled with parties and poets, writers and a never-ending smorgasbord of art and cocktail of ideas.

His was, as Sunday Today host Willie Geist says every week, a life well-lived.