MANSFIELD — Chan Stevens was an entrepreneur and businessman for the joy of working with people, said family member John C. Roby.
“He was in it for the people, not the money,” Roby said. “He was just an industrious, kind-hearted, hard-working guy.”
A man of many talents, interests and intelligence, Walter Chandler “Chan” Stevens, Jr. died at 89 years old on Jan. 19.
He worked at Stevens Manufacturing in Lexington producing thermostats with his father after graduating from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1955.
Stevens also took his entrepreneurial spirit to Put-in-Bay, where he worked with one of his sons to manage a golf cart rental business.
Roby said he couldn’t count all the businesses Stevens developed or worked with at some point in his career. Even into his 80s, Stevens was closely involved with a number of Put-in-Bay businesses.
“He looked like father time, but was always working,” Roby said. “Always looking to fix something, making something run better — whether that be a machine or a person.”
Stevens spent nearly 60 years on the Catalyst Life Services board of trustees. He was honored as the inaugural inductee of Catalyst Life Services’ Hall of Fame in 2021.
Stevens started driving children with disabilities to physical therapy in Cleveland at the age of 16. He helped start Progress Industries Workshops under Catalyst Life Services in 1964, which helps adults with disabilities find jobs.
Kathy Daniels, Catalyst Life Services board member, said she’s sure Stevens started work with the North Central Ohio Rehabilitation Center before he was able to drive.
“He was an amazing individual,” she said. “If someone needed anything, he would move mountains or give the shirt off his back, which I’m sure he did many times.”
Daniels said Stevens was an easy appointment to the Catalyst Life Services Hall of Fame as the longest serving board member.
“He would always find a better way to make things work,” she said. “He was one of those guys where he would say ‘quit talking about it, let’s just fix it.’ Chan was always about making the best better.”
Roby has served alongside Stevens on the Richland County Foundation and Catalyst Life Services boards. Roby said Stevens was skilled at integrating his business knowledge and connections into nonprofit fundraisers.
“He was on the first and second capital campaigns for the Catalyst rehab center,” Roby said. “He put together this dream team of people who got together to help put a facelift on this facility.”
Roby said part of what led Stevens to nonprofit work was knowing he could lend his organizational and business skills to missions he believed in.
“I can’t do what these people do when providing these services, but I do know a little bit about running businesses,” Roby said. “So we can help create a framework for not-for-profits to still have rainy day funds and continue their mission.”
Roby said Stevens believed in the “multiplier effect” that comes from helping people.
“If you help save or stabilize one person, there’s generally a group of people around them that care about that person — and the number of people served indirectly is vast,” he said.
Stevens requested memorial donations be made to Catalyst Life Services or the Richland County Foundation in lieu of flowers.
“I think he would want to be remembered as someone who used his industrious nature to give back and help those who just needed a little extra help,” Roby said. “That was his last chapter of his life — he was a businessman that gave back.”
