A month ago, on June 1, I stopped by to see Ed Stahl at the invitation of his partner MarLyn Rasmussen, at an Almond Grove historical home patriotically decorated early in the runup to the 4th of July.
He sat in a well-padded living room chair and talked about his life and work since arriving in Los Gatos after his military service in the 1960s: of raising a family and operating a travel agency through all the changes that the town, his travel business and he personally had been through in the six-plus decades hence.
I’d known Ed for more than four of them. He was an original investor and champion of my first business, the Los Gatos Weekly.
He sponsored me as a member of the Los Gatos Rotary Club, where I learned about commerce and community, having graduated a year before from a liberal arts school where they taught none of that.
As the owner of Travel Advisors of Los Gatos, with a home and a downtown commercial property here, Ed was thoroughly a part of this town.
He supported a ridiculous number of activities, organizations and community initiatives that enhanced Los Gatos.
It would be impossible to document them all because he never demanded credit or acknowledgment. He knew that simple generosity was its own recompense.
It was a privilege and honor to write and publish the June interview and photo that appeared during what turned out to be the last month of his abundantly lived 94 years.
I mean, how many people go to the North Pole when they’re a day shy of 91? It’s documented in the Guinness Book of World Records. Someone may break that record at some future moment, but Ed passed with his snow boots on.
Although age had slowed his logistics and recollection, as he approached the 95 mark, his positive demeanor and facility for social connection bested most people half—or a third—of his chronological age.
Years ago, he’d told me that when he ran into people with whom he’d experienced extreme conflict, he’d greet them politely and gracefully keep moving. That was good mentorship, if hard to live up to.
“He was the best,” his daughter Susan O’Neal texted.
Service: Sat., July 26, 11am, Good Samaritan Episcopal Church, 15040 Union Ave., San Jose. Reception and Celebration of Life to follow.
