Copter Crash in Pnoenix Killed Former Seattle Businessman
February 15th, 2010 by Rachel PritchettPHOENIX (AP) — The owner and founder of Services Group of
America — Arizona’s second-largest privately held company — was
among the victims killed in a helicopter crash just north of
Phoenix, a state senator said Monday.
Sen. Jonathan Paton eulogized Thomas J. Stewart on the Senate floor
on Monday, saying Stewart died in the crash along with his wife and
one of his six children.
Officials with the Scottsdale-based food service distributing and
real estate firm planned an announcement later Monday, but hadn’t
confirmed Stewart’s death.
The Eurocopter EC135 went down in a rural area just north of
Phoenix on Sunday. A Maricopa County sheriff’s spokeswoman said
mechanical failure is suspected because witnesses saw parts flying
off the stricken aircraft right before it crashed.
Stewart, in his mid-60s, joined his father’s Seattle-based port
support business in the late 1960s and expanded it into insurance
and food distribution, fruit packing and retailing.
After spinning off some subsidiaries, he moved the company to
Arizona in 2006. He had a home in the Phoenix area and a ranch in
northern Arizona.
Services Group of America’s Web site says its customers include
independent and chain restaurants, schools, hospitals, hotels,
cruise lines and government foodservice operations. It has 4,000
employees and is ranked 157th among the nation’s largest private
companies, according to Forbes Magazine.
“I got a chance to know Tom and work with him and it is devastating
for the community and for his family,” Paton said. “My heart goes
out to their employees and the rest of the business community
that’s grieving right now for this family.”
According to a biography of Stewart on his company’s Web site, he
began working for his father’s business, Seattle Stevedore Company,
in 1967, after graduating from college. He was named vice president
in 1970, his father gave him half the business in 1976 and he
became CEO in 1981 at age 36. He expanding the business through a
series of purchases, buying up port operators on the West Coast,
produce and foodstuffs companies.
After splitting the company in 1989 to dismantle the partnership,
Stewart ended up with Services Group of America and shed its
stevedoring subsidiaries.
His biography said Stewart was an avid golfer, horseman, rancher,
fisherman, skier, pilot, scuba diver and team roper.
Scripps Interactive Newspapers Group
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