Rosalie Laird, who co-owned the Point Reyes Light for a brief period in the 1980s before reneging on her purchase agreement and returning the paper to its former publishers, died in October in Washington State, according to news reports. She was 89 years old. A former Greenbrae resident whose professional background had been in education and school administration, Ms. Laird purchased the Light in 1981 from David and Cathy Mitchell. She had two business partners, William and Marsha Remas, who owned and operated two other weeklies, the Twin Cities Times, which covered Corte Madera and Larkspur, and the San Geronimo Valley Times. Although newspapering was new to Ms. Laird, her uncle Constantine Eschwig had co-founded the Point Reyes Beacon, a precursor to the Light, in 1947. She said at the time that taking over the Light was “the fulfillment of a lifetime goal.” The terms of the sale were $5,000 down and monthly payments on a loan of $105,000. Mr. Mitchell said at the time that he had many other offers—some worth more money—but that he was inclined to take this one due to the local publishers’ experience and Ms. Laird’s connection to the local journalism. The partners helmed the paper during the storm of 1982, when rains walloped West Marin, destroyed houses near the water in Stinson Beach and Bolinas, and blocked off Inverness from the rest of the world for a week. While the coverage of the storm was great, keeping a newspaper running and solvent was another matter. They soon found it was not so easy to run a small country weekly; they fell short on the payments and nearly declared bankruptcy. In a statement published in December 1983, Ms. Laird wrote, “Running a community newspaper is hard work and requires long hours, compensated by sheer joy as well as utter frustration, and those that devote their time to such an endeavor know to be a labor of love.”  She added, “I’m not willing, however, to sacrifice my health.” The Mitchells, who had owned the paper for five years before selling to Ms. Laird, called in the loan and took over full production again, effective Jan. 1, 1984. “The financial situation is all too real,” Mr. Mitchell told the Petaluma Argus-Courier at the time. “The Light was in danger of going into bankruptcy if I hadn’t taken it back.” The Mitchells sued Ms. Laird in Marin County Civil Court for breach of contract after she sold $4,000 of equipment that had been used as collateral on the note for the sale. Ms. Laird, who had attended Mills College in Berkeley and graduated from San Francisco State College with a degree in English literature and psychology and a secondary teaching credential, returned to education after leaving the Light. She is survived by her three children, Michelle Laird Coady, Lauren Laird and Scott Laird, and four grandchildren.