Shavitz, a “a wild-bearded and free-spirited Maine man” and beekeeper, co-founded the company with artist Roxanne Quimby in 1984, the company said in a statement. Last summer, he told The New Yorker: “I’ve got everything I need: a nice piece of land with hawks and owls and incredible sunsets, and the good will of my neighbors”.
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After his military discharge, he went home to New York and wandered the city taking photographs, many of which appeared in such venerable publications as the New York Times and Time and Life magazines.
If you’re a fan of the Burt’s Bees line of natural, environmentally friendly personal care products, you might have assumed that the Walt-Whitman lookalike on the label was a generic hippie dreamed up by marketing experts. Shavitz, who sold honey on the side of the road, joined forces with Quimby to make candles using beeswax from his hives. “I am deeply saddened”, Ms. Quimby said in an e-mailed statement to The Associated Press. The famously enigmatic Shavitz may have found a few of them amusing, and the diverse nature of the reactions to his passing seem to point to the footprint he left in the marketplace more than anything else.
Although Shavitz’s share was bought out nearly 15 years ago, the company still commemorated the co-founder and posted an obituary on their website.
But Mr. Shavitz’ relationship with the brand was complex, and as the company grew and moved from Maine to North Carolina, he retained no equity in it. If there is one thing we will remember from Burts life, in our fast-paced, high-tech culture, its to never lose sight of our relationship with nature.In recent years, Shavitz lived in a cluttered house with no running water.
He tried leaving Maine once before, spending a winter on a warm island, but was drawn back to Maine.
He later settled in Maine and took up beekeeping.
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Shavitz’s remarkable life was the subject of an award-winning documentary entitled Burt’s Buzz that was released in 2014. A converted turkey coop that he once called home still stands on the property as a token of the past. There’s no noise. There’s no children screaming. He had been caught up in the “back to the land” movement, which urged its adherents to decamp to rural America, living simple lives and farming their own food.
