Porter Bibb, a Visionary and Devotee of Southampton, Dies at 87

Porter Bibb is a man who lived many lives.

He was a journalist, an investment banker, the first publisher of Rolling Stone magazine and an executive producer for the Maysles Brothers. He wrote books, covered the White House for Newsweek and studied economics. He was a trend predictor, a raconteur and a creative visionary, while also a gentleman, humble and kind.

And he deeply cared for Southampton.

“I just see Porter as this Renaissance man, because he really did a lot of different things — and I think he was interested in everything,” his wife, Sandra Bibb, said last week. “He was interested in the world around him.”

On January 4, Porter Bibb died from complications of fourth-stage prostate cancer while surrounded by his immediate family at Weill Cornell Medical Center in New York City. He was 87.

“He was very unusual and I’m very lucky to have had him for a big brother,” his sister, Elizabeth Bibb Yamashita, said. “We’re going to miss him, but he had a great life, so that’s some consolation. His three beautiful daughters, they really are terrific. So that’s his real legacy.”

David Porter Bibb III was born on April 2, 1937, into a quintessential Kentucky family in Louisville — where its members included the first and second governors of Alabama, according to his sister. He was the eldest of six, she said, and often took on a father-like role with his younger siblings, who all looked up to him.

“He was always the big brother who was off to college and being very cool,” she said, “and he would come swooping in with all sorts of very sophisticated things going on.”

Bibb was attracted to characters, Yamashita said, which began at Louisville Male High School, where he was a member of the Athenaeum Literary Association. It was essentially a fraternity, she recalled with a laugh — and there, he became good friends with Hunter S. Thompson.

“I can remember Hunter sitting at our kitchen table, yacking with my mother. My mother actually loved him,” Yamashita said of the boy, who would go on to become a renowned author and journalist. “Porter was always drawn to interesting people and very much had a kind of a global perspective very young.”

Bibb went on to study history at Yale University, earned graduate degrees from Harvard Business School and London School of Economics, and even enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve, his sister said.

He was athletic, excelled at skiing and tennis, and loved the ocean. He ran five New York City Marathons, his wife said, and religiously participated in Southampton’s Polar Bear Plunge.

“We used to always tease him about being Dorian Gray, because he never looked his age,” Yamashita said. “We always said, ‘Oh, there’s a picture up in the attic somewhere that’s getting very old,’ because he just, literally, until 87, he looked 20 years, 30 years younger. He was just very, very dashing.”

Sandra Bibb first crossed paths with her future husband more than three decades ago, when they both worked in investment banking. He had awkwardly announced that he had four girlfriends — and she made it clear that she wasn’t interested.

But one Christmas Eve, that changed for her. She had invited him to a party at her home and, after everyone left, he took her out to dinner around the corner and came back to her apartment to help her tidy up.

“I was like, who does that?” she said. “Nobody does that unless you’re really good friends. It just changed the dynamic.”

They wed on June 8, 1997 — his third marriage — and became a blended family, she said. He is survived by his three daughters — Hilary Porado, Addison Porter Walker and Zoe Bright — three grandchildren, and all five of his siblings — Richard, Susannah, Walter, Robert and Elizabeth.

“He’d always write me notes, and he was always thoughtful and generous and sweet and kind and lovely,” his wife said. “He was a very, very sweet, romantic guy. I’m going to miss everything about him.”

A summer resident of Amagansett for most of his childhood, Bibb devoted his free time to his community in Southampton, where he lived for nearly 40 years. Leveraging his media, entertainment and technology experience, he was instrumental in keeping the National Public Radio affiliate, WLIU-FM, afloat after it parted ways with Stony Brook Southampton.

And toward the end of his life, he poured his energy into saving the windmill on the campus — pushing for its move to the heart of Southampton Village where it once stood, according to his colleague in the endeavor, architect Siamak Samii.

“His kindness is something that I think we can all take a lesson from because you can never go wrong with that,” he said. “Life is not easy, and there’s a lot of ups and downs, and it’s these kinds of kindnesses that makes it more bearable and somehow sweet.

“It’s like the hello that you say on the sidewalk to somebody passing by and make their day,” he said. “That’s the kind of person Porter was.”