A good man passed away this weekend.....

Stewart R. Mott, a philanthropist whose gifts to progressive and sometimes offbeat causes were often upstaged by his eccentricities, like cultivating a large garden atop his Manhattan penthouse, complete with 460 plant species (including 17 types of radishes) and a chicken coop, died on Thursday night.

Mr. Mott’s philanthropy went toward causes like birth control, abortion rights, sex research, arms control, feminism, civil liberties, governmental reform, gay rights and research on extrasensory perception.

His political giving, often directed against incumbent presidents, was the most visible. In 1968, he heavily bankrolled Senator Eugene J. McCarthy’s bid for president. Four years later, he was the biggest contributor to Senator George S. McGovern, the Democratic presidential nominee.

He once lived on a Chinese junk in the Hudson River as a self-described beatnik and kept notes to himself on Turkish cigarette boxes, accumulating thousands. He held folk music festivals to promote peace and love. The garden at his Manhattan penthouse (which he sold some years ago) was famous; at one point Mr. Mott taught a course in city gardening at the New School. He told an interviewer that he lay awake wondering how to grow a better radish.

His philanthropy began when he returned to Flint and started a branch of Planned Parenthood. He then traveled the nation on behalf of Planned Parenthood.