Burton Page

Burton Page passed away on Thursday, August 22, 2013, after a valiant battle with lung cancer – having never smoked a day in his life. He celebrated his 62nd birthday on July 21. He and his wife, Nancy Tidona, shared 34 years together. He is also survived by his sons, Kevin and Ryan, his older brother Parker and wife Laura, younger brother Owen, brother-in-law Robert and wife Barbara, nieces Larkin Page, Amelia Tidona, and Julia Tidona, and a set of close friends who will remember him always. Burton was born “Lee Burton Page” in Savannah, Georgia, to Owen and Barbara West Page. He was an altar boy at St John's Episcopal Church and played Tigers Little League football. He played basketball for Savannah Country Day School, famously scoring the buzzer-beating basket in overtime for a key win and being carried off on the shoulders of his teammates. He moved with his mother and brothers to Chapel Hill in 1966, where he made his mark at Chapel Hill High School as captain of the tennis team and graduated in 1969. He was widely acknowledged as a great dancer. He matriculated into the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He majored in Religion, earning his B.A. in 1973. After college, he travelled in Europe and lived in Washington, DC; Santa Cruz, CA; Sedona, AZ; Flagstaff, AZ (where he attended Northern Arizona University for a year in Psychology); and Chapel Hill once again before beginning his graduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania in State College in the fall of 1978. He graduated in 1980 and left State College with both his M.S. in Health Administration and his future wife, Nancy. They married in 1985 and settled in Wilmington, DE. Burton worked in health and hospital administration while earning his law degree from Temple University. He was a “Philadelphia lawyer” for five years, first at Stradley Ronan and then at Blank Rome, then joined the law department of Smithkline Beecham Pharmaceuticals (later Glaxo Smithkline) in 1992. He received the SB Impact Award for significant contributions resulting in 29 state legislative victories in support of the Company’s vaccine business during 2000. He was an independent health policy consultant for 5 years prior to the family move from Wilmington to Columbus. In 2006 he joined TechColumbus. As Senior Director of Technology Commercialization, he led a team of technology scouts to identify and promote scalable early stage technologies from institutional research partners including Ohio State University, Nationwide Children’s Hospital, OhioHealth, and Battelle. His team’s activities resulted in 24 start-ups and $2.6M in seed stage investments. He retired from TechColumbus in September 2012. The love of his life was his family – with North Carolina basketball running a close second. “I’m a Tar Heel born, and Tar Heel bred, and when I die, I’m a Tar Heel dead.” Another famous Tar Heel, Charles Kuralt, wrote in the Forward to his book “On the Road” based on his long-running TV journal of backroads America: “I have tried to go slow, stick to the back roads, take time to meet people, listen to yarns, notice the countryside go by, and feel the seasons change.” Burton loved Charles Kuralt. In lieu of flowers, gifts can be made to The James Cancer Hospital in Burton's name. Please be sure to include Burton’s name and send donations to: James Development Office 660 Ackerman Rd P.O. Box 183112 Columbus, OH 43123