Gerald L. Stanford

1939 - 2023

News Story
By Mark Zaborney
Blade Staff Writer

Gerald L. "Jerry" Stanford, who left factory work behind to make a thriving livelihood out of his affinity for the outdoors, died Aug. 3 in his Monclova Township home. He was 83.

He had congestive heart failure, his wife, Betty Stanford, said.

He tended his own yard until weeks before his death. This spring, he was aboard his mower for his Stanford & Sons lawn care and snow plowing business, which he founded 47 years ago.

"I've never known a man who worked the way he worked," Mrs. Stanford said. "He did not have a stop button on him.

"He loved being out of doors. He loved the sunshine. He loved the wind. He loved the grass. He loved nature," she said.

His son-in-law Steve Guerrette stepped in to help customers after Mr. Stanford became ill.

The Stanfords moved to their multi-acre property near Whitehouse in 1995. In the years after, he planted at least 70 trees and pampered the flowers and other plants he grew.

"His hobby was working outside and growing beautiful flowers," Mrs. Stanford said. "That was his work, that was his passion. If it was a flowering tree, he wanted it. If it was a flower bush, a flowering shrub, he wanted it."

He'd mowed lawns while growing up in Maumee. While working at the Libbey-Owens-Ford Co. in Rossford, he started a side business, offering lawn care and landscaping services. He did not return to L-O-F after a settlement was reached in a labor dispute and work stoppage, Mrs. Stanford said.

"From that point, there was no stopping him. It was strictly the lawn business," she said.

His daughter, Amy Shiffer, said: "He loved being his own boss.

"He never advertised. He didn't need to," Ms. Shiffer said. "Everything was word of mouth. He had a lot of accounts, both lawn care and [snow] plowing. He put 100 percent into what he did."

He served residential and commercial customers, mostly in the South Toledo and Maumee area. He kept weather radios around the house and remembered winter weather patterns past.

"He used to get so excited when they forecast a few inches," Ms. Shiffer said. "He knew exactly when to go out."

He had been going to a family cottage on Coldwater Lake in Branch County, Mich., since age 5. He bought a cottage next door in 1976, and was there most weekends from early spring into September, with his wife - and, often, extended family.

"The cottage was the most important thing in his life, besides his work," Ms. Shiffer said.

For Mr. Stanford, his stepchildren became his children.

"He was in our life for 34 years," said stepdaughter Anne Bishop. "It was a blended family, but he was a great man."

He liked to tease and, with good cheer, gave out nicknames, said Mrs. Bishop, whom he called FBI on Wheels, because "I could find out anything. He was just funny."

His wife said: "He would wake up every morning and have a plan for the day. He would be happy and whistling and singing. He was my sunshine."

He was born Dec. 1, 1939, to Evelyn and Clarence Stanford. He grew up in Maumee and from childhood worked in the grocery store on East John Street operated by his grandparents Peter and Lola Brell.

He was a 1957 graduate of Maumee High School and attended the University of Toledo. He was a veteran of the Army National Guard.

He formerly was married to the late Connie Heltebrake Stanford and the late Phyllis Mason Moulton Stanford.

Surviving are his wife, the former Betty Pease Cunningham, whom he married in January, 1998; daughter, Amy Jo Shiffer; stepsons John Cunningham, Paul Cunningham, Jeff Moulton, and Jamie Moulton; stepdaughters Anne Bishop, Beth Guerrette, Connie Cass, and Kendra Moulton; grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.

At Mr. Stanford's request, there will be no services. Arrangements are by the Cremation Society of Toledo.