Chaplin B. Barnes

Chaplin B. Barnes, a lawyer, conservationist, preservationist and local historian, died July 20th at his home in Westerly, Rhode Island.
He was born at New Haven, CT, April 7, 1941, the son of Irston Roberts and Lidorra Putney Barnes. Educated at the Choate School (cum laude, 1958), Yale College (B.A., magna cum laude, 1962), and Yale Law School (J. D., 1965); he subsequently studied international law at University College, Oxford University.
He has noted that his early development was more influenced than he had realized by a father, Irston Roberts Barnes (Yale '26, Ph.D. '28) who, though professionally a distinguished economist, found his greatest satisfaction in his avocation of ornithology and his commitment to what in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s was called simply "conservation," including his weekly "Naturalist" columns in the Washington Post. Roger Tory Peterson, Rachel Carson and Supreme Court Associate Justice William O. Douglas were close friends and colleagues.
Mr. Barnes's love of history, literature and art led to his undergraduate Yale honors major in History, the Arts and Letters, which he found a wonderful and enriching program. He later wrote his 1965 Yale Law School thesis on a new legal device to protect land, the conservation easement. This in turn led to a number of years with the National Audubon Society (where he headed its international program), various federal agencies (EPA, and the [White House] Council on Environmental Quality, CEQ), the Piedmont Conservation Council (PEC), a regional land trust/conservation organization in Virginia, where he served as President. These were followed by an extraordinary stint with the 1982-85 Conference on the Long-Term Worldwide Biological Consequences of Nuclear War, involving astrophysicist Carl Sagan and a roster of internationally renowned biologists, physicists and climatologists. The subject phenomenon was so-called 'nuclear winter'. That event included the first "space bridge" television linkup meeting between members of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and their Soviet Academy counterparts. A post-Conference book, The Cold and the Dark, The World After Nuclear War, written by Paul R. Ehrlich, Carl Sagan, Donald Kennedy and Walter Orr Roberts was published by W.W. Norton, New York, 1984.
The sense of place, and his life-long attachment to Watch Hill and the Rhode Island coast, where he had grown up summers, led to his 1985 return full time to that community and the practice of law in Rhode Island and nearby Connecticut. That in turn led to his helping to found a local land trust, conservation and historic preservation organization, the Watch Hill Conservancy, which in "retirement" he served as part time Executive Director. He was involved in one way or another (active member, Board member or emeritus officer) with all the other organizations of Watch Hill. He wrote a history of Watch Hill, Watch Hill Through Time, published by the Conservancy. Subsequently, the Conservancy commissioned another publication, Watch Hill Style, a history of the architecture of Watch Hill, of which he was a collaborating author. An independently produced documentary film, based on Watch Hill Through Time, and titled Watch Hill: Portrait of a New England Seaside Village, was aired, in March 2014, on the Rhode Island Public Broadcasting System, as part of their spring membership promotion. It continues to be aired from time to time and is scheduled to be a centerpiece of the channel's fall membership promotion.
Mr. Barnes always stated that he had no intention to retire, but to remain as busy with a variety of organizations and causes as in his earlier professional life. If his "pond" was small, he said, it was special, beautiful and well worth commitment. Yet he did retire when forced to do so by cancer in late 2013.
In recent years and months, Mr. Barnes received a number of commendations from the organizations he served, namely, the Watch Hill Fire District (Citizens Service Award, 2009), the Town Council of Westerly (2013), and the Watch Hill Chapel Society (2013). Also in 2013, the Watch Hill Conservancy honored him with the designation of Watch Hill's most significant natural resource, its barrier beach, Napatree Point, as the Chaplin B. Barnes Napatree Point Conservation Area. At the time of the airing of the documentary, Mr. Barnes received a Gubernatorial Citation from Governor Lincoln D. Chafee, and an appointment as the first Distinguished Senior Fellow of the University of Rhode Island Coastal Institute, in recognition, in the Governor's words, of his "work to protect and preserve the natural and cultural resources of Watch Hill… an historically important, ecologically significant, and beautiful corner of the Ocean State."
He was a member of The Misquamicut Club (Watch Hill), the Watch Hill Yacht Club, the Ocean House Club (Watch Hill), the Elizabethan Club and Mory's Association (both of Yale and New Haven), the Yale Club of New York City, and the Society of Mayflower Descendants in the State of New York.
He is survived by his second wife, Barbara Trowbridge Barnes, and two daughters by his previous marriage, Sarah Chaplin Barnes of Yarmouth, Maine, and Diana Brewster Barnes Bender (and her husband D. Farrell Bender) of Los Angeles, California, two stepchildren, Nathalie Sheriff Comstock of Scarborough, Maine and Andrew R. Sheriff (and his wife, Amanda C. Sheriff) of Magnolia, Massachusetts, three grandchildren, and four step-grandchildren.
A private graveside committal service will be held at the convenience of the family at River Bend Cemetery, Westerly. A Memorial Service will take place at the Watch Hill Chapel, July 26th, at 10:00 a.m.
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Home and Hospice Care of Rhode Island (1085 North Main Street, Providence, RI 02904).
Arrangements have been entrusted to the Buckler-Johnston Funeral Home, 121 Main St. Westerly.