Harry Angelo Merlo

From the humblest of beginnings to the pinnacle of success, Harry was always just “Harry.” If one called him Mr. Merlo he’d respond, “Mr. Merlo was my father. I’m Harry.”

Born and raised in poverty in a high Sierra lumber camp, he was the son of Italian immigrants. His mother, a profound influence on Harry’s achievements, taught Harry “Che non lavaro, non deve mangare”... “if you don’t work, you don’t eat.” The foundation of Harry’s life was hard work, from childhood boarding house chores to physical improvements on his beloved ranch in eastern Oregon.

Harry, on the cusp of America’s greatest generation, began his worldly successes as a Marine officer during WW II. After the war and the Marine Corps, with a degree from the University of California, and with the post-war building boom under way, Harry launched his legendary forest products career.

As a child growing up in a lumber yard, sawdust was in Harry’s veins. Summer jobs during college injected more. In 1949 he landed his first full-time job with the Rounds and Kilpatrick Lumber Company at Cloverdale, California. As a shipping clerk earning $350 a month, Harry launched a career that would redefine the forest products industry.

By 1952 Harry had so captured the attention of the absentee owners of the company that he was asked to move to San Francisco to handle sales of lumber for the company. He developed relations with customers based on quick and accurate lumber deliveries, a captivating personality, and a magic ingredient--wine! Harry won and secured the loyalty of customers by including a case of Italian Swiss Colony wine in every railroad car of lumber that he shipped.

By 1958, at the age of 33, Harry was named vice president and general manager of Rounds and Kilpatrick Lumber Company, selling redwood by the train load across America. Harry knew in abundance how to buy timber, produce and sell lumber, manage people, and he had grand ambitions for the company. So did Robert Pamplin, Sr., Chief Executive Officer of Georgia Pacific Corporation. In a rapid and strategic purchase of Rounds and Kilpatrick Lumber Company, Georgia Pacific acquired the company and its greatest asset, Harry A. Merlo. In 1967 Harry became vice president in charge of timber, plywood, and lumber operations at Georgia Pacific’s giant Samoa, California operation. Harry’s leadership at Samoa catapulted the operation’s profits to an extraordinary level in just one year. Harry was soon moved to Georgia Pacific Corporate offices in Portland.

Through aggressive purchases of timberland and, particularly, the manufacturing operations that accompanied those timberlands, Georgia Pacific caught the attention of the Federal Trade Commission, claiming an acquired monopoly in the Southern pine plywood market. As a result, a new company was born, Louisiana-Pacific Corporation, and in 1972 Harry became President and Chief Operating Officer. Soon he would add the title of Chairman of the Board. Success was neither immediate nor easy. History shows that Harry’s tenacity, work ethic, respect for the dignity of his employees, his insatiable appetite for new and innovative products, and his intellectual curiosity brought Harry and Louisiana-Pacific to the precipice of unprecedented success in 1978.

He discovered a product being advocated in a display booth at the National Association of Home Builders while attending a trade show. That product was called “waferwood.” Harry was prescient. He knew the preferred building material in America, plywood, had to change because the resources to make plywood were being withdrawn from the market by changing forest policy.

While other leaders and competitors in the forest products industry scoffed, Harry bet his future and that of Louisiana-Pacific on a new form of building panels, a product that would evolve from “waferwood” to “oriented strand board.” Making building panels from small logs, waste wood, recycled wood, low value invasive trees--fiber once discarded or burned—created a product superior to plywood without a reliance on large trees that were becoming increasingly rare. Today, one seldom sees a home or wooden building under construction in America that is not using oriented strand board, Harry’s vision, rather than plywood.

Until his final day, Harry never lost enthusiasm for innovation and creativity for that which might become a better and more useful forest product. Always curious, his eyes would sparkle and his enthusiasm erupt when he’d meet an entrepreneur with a better idea. Harry believed in wood products and, even more, he believed in people with better ideas.

Harry’s career at Louisiana Pacific was extraordinary, both for business success and for community involvement. He brought professional soccer to Portland. He brought Davis Cup tennis to Portland, and he brought great success to the entire soccer program at the University of Portland where the perfectly designed and maintained soccer field carries Harry’s name. The aptly named Harry A. Merlo Hall at the World Forestry Center documents his generosity and his vision for global forestry.

After leaving Louisiana Pacific in 1995 Harry focused his considerable energies on passions he’d had little time for during his career: creating a stunning forested ranch, a model for forest stewardship in eastern Oregon; encouraging his son Harry, Jr. to grow grapes for award winning wines in California: fishing from his boat in Alaskan waters; hunting deer and elk each autumn; creating a better Oregon through the philanthropy of his Merlo Foundation; and most importantly, enjoying occasions, both small and large, with his wife Flo. For Harry, watching a sporting event, attending a social function, traveling, or receiving a myriad of awards, all were joyous occasions when shared with Flo. Their time together became, and endured, as Harry’s happiest time in a life.

Besides his wife Flo Newton Merlo, Harry leaves a son Harry Merlo Jr., his daughter-in-law Billie Merlo, grandsons Dominic and Anthony Merlo, and two step-children from a previous marriage. Harry is also survived by two brothers, Pete Merlo of Chico, CA and Frank Merlo of Sacramento, CA as well as many nieces and nephews.

It was Harry’s wish that, instead of gifts or flowers, contributions be made to the Harry A. Merlo Foundation, Inc., 1001 S.E. Sandy Blvd., Portland, OR 97214 so as to sustain the charitable work that has long impacted and improved Portland and the region.

A Memorial Mass will be held at 3:00 PM Saturday, November 19, 2016 at the Chapel of Christ the Teacher on the campus of University of Portland, 5000 N. Willamette Blvd., Portland, OR. University of Portland President; Reverend Mark L. Poorman, C.S.C. will preside.