Blakeley and Linde honored at United Way Leadership Breakfast

The 17th annual Real Estate & Building Industry Leadership Breakfast at the Westin Copley Place, Uniting to End Family Homelessness, honored Gerald Blakeley Jr. and the late Edward Linde. The commercial-industrial R.E. members from Greater Boston firms heard Mortimer Zuckerman, chairman/CEO of Boston Properties, give the keynote address. He and Linde met Blakeley, former president, chairman and principal stockholder of Cabot, Cabot & Forbes (CC&F), when they were employed by the developer. Linde and Zuckerman were co-founders and CEOs of Boston Properties when they left CC&F in 1970. United Way of Mass. Bay & Merrimack Valley were presented the 2010 Norman Leventhal/Edwin Sidman R.E. & Building Industry Leadership Award. Zuckerman is now chairman and editor in chief of U.S. News & World Report, publisher of the New York Daily News and a regular commentator on The McLaughlin Group. CC&F planned the initial development of 8,200 acres in Laguna Niguel, Calif., and Wintergreen, a 13,000 acre resort in Virginia. The firm also rejuvenated a half dozen of the nation's city centers and constructed landmark buildings in Boston, Chicago, Washington, Los Angeles, St. Louis and Philadelphia, among other cities. Linde led Boston Properties' transition from a private company to a public company in 1997 and helped assemble and develop some of the country's most iconic office buildings, including the Prudential Center (Boston), Embarcadero Ctr. (San Francisco), the G.M. Bldg., 601 Lexington Ave., 399 Park Ave. (New York City), and 509 9th St., 901 New York Ave. and Market Sq. North (Washington, D.C.).