James Wyman rose from the ranks to lead SuperValu: The business leader also knew whirlwind romance, proposing to his wife of 53 years after only two dates.

Dec 26, 2008 (Star Tribune - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- SVU | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- James T. Wyman started out recruiting delivery boys to work for the Minneapolis Star Journal when he came home from serving in World War II. Twenty years later, he was a youthful president of SuperValu.

"He really did start off at the bottom of the ladder," said his daughter, Betsy Wilcox.

Wyman was in his early 40s when he took the top job at SuperValu and led the Minnesota-based grocery retailer and distributor when it was first listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 1967, his children said. He served on the boards of a variety of companies, including Green Giant and First National Bank of Minneapolis, and became chairman of SuperValu's executive committee after taking an early retirement around 1970, they said.

Despite an impressive corporate resume and the hard work he put in to lengthen it, Wyman was a loving father who retired so he could spend more time with his family, his children said.

"Particularly for somebody in need, he was right there," said his son Jim Wyman. Once, when Jim was fresh out of college in the late '70s and living the "lonely existence" of a traveling salesman in South Dakota, Wyman drove out from Minnesota and spent a few days cheering him up on the road.

And during his mother's years-long journey with Alzheimer's disease, he flew out to visit her at least once a month in the California nursing home where she lived.

Wyman battled the same disease in turn. He died on Dec. 19 at age 88, surrounded by his family at the home near Lake Minnetonka where he had moved in 1953.

Wyman was born in 1920 and grew up in Minneapolis. He attended the Blake School and Yale, where he majored in English and played hockey. He graduated in 1942 and went straight to officer training for the Navy, then served on a destroyer escort in the North Atlantic.

When the war ended, he chose Minneapolis over New York and worked in the circulation and advertising departments of the Star Journal before taking a job with the grocery giant and rising through the company's ranks.

Wyman married his wife, Elizabeth Winston, in 1950 after a whirlwind romance that was cemented when he proposed after just two dates, his children said. "I've never understood it," his daughter said, but the Wymans were a happy and stable couple. Elizabeth, called Betts, died five years ago, after 53 years of marriage.

The morning after Wyman asked Betts to marry him, he went to lunch with her father, Wilcox said. Wyman showed up at the Twin Cities hotel where they had agreed to meet with a briefcase stuffed with his own medical and financial records -- proof of his suitability as a husband. His future father-in-law took one look at the briefcase and said, "Put all that away."

Wyman is survived by his three children, Jim, Betsy and Steven, and three grandchildren. Private family services will be held.

Sarah Lemagie --952-882-9016

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