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La Tercera, Dec. 9, 2015
"Environmentalist entrepreneur Douglas Tompkins dies," writes Santiago-based daily La Tercera on its front page Wednesday, after U.S. conservationist and North Face Inc. founder Douglas Tompkins died in a kayaking accident, in his adopted country of Chile.
Tompkins, 72, was kayaking with five others on General Carrera Lake in far southern Chile when strong waves caused their kayaks to capsize. He was then flown via helicopter to a hospital in nearby Coyhaique, where he died from severe hypothermia.
In addition to outdoor gear maker The North Face, Tompkins also co-founded the clothing brand Esprit in the 1960s. He sold both companies and, with his wife Kris McDivitt Tompkins, acquired huge tracts of land — more than 2 million acres in total — in Chilean and Argentine Patagonia for preservation purposes. His 715,000-acre Pumalín Park in Chile is one of the world's largest private nature reserves.