The founder of Contractors Equipment Rentals in Elmhurst, Ill., Stanley Sloan, has died.
Sloan passed away in Elmhurst, surrounded by his family. Sloan is a native of Detroit, where he spent his childhood and young adulthood. He is also an Air Force Veteran of the Korean way with four years of military service.
He graduated from Hillsdale College in Hillsdale, Mich., before moving to the Chicago area as an accountant with Montgomery Wards. Sloan met Joanne Kulinski and they married in 1963 and were transferred to St. Paul, Minn., where they began their family of four children.
Eventually, the family moved back to Chicago and settled in Elmhurst for the rest of his life. Sloan was the husband of Joanne, nee Kulinski, for 59 years; father of Suzanne (Jonathan Eichman), Julianne, John (Debbie), and Robert (Sheryl) Sloan; grandfather of Andrew, Julia, Anna, Christopher, Amanda, Daniel, Joseph, Thomas, Jacob, and Matthew; son of the late Stanley and the late Julia, nee Surowicz and brother of Michael (Jane) Sloan and the late Suzanne Sloan.
The family spent time together at the family cottage on Lake Erie in Canada for relaxing summers at the beach and later in life during winters inside around the fireplace.
Sloan also had a great love for his country and especially his adopted hometown of Elmhurst and the Chicago area. He found the city to be a dynamic and growing source of business opportunities and he loved to discuss business, markets, and new entrepreneurial ideas, which eventually led to the launch of Contractors Equipment Rentals, or C.E. Rentals, which he ran and worked at for over three decades with his son Robert as a successful business.
He could be found each morning reading the Wall Street Journal catching up on the news of the day. Sloan worked for the "Big Three" automakers during the summer during high school and never lost his love of cars. He followed each new change with great interest, such as when the bigger cars became smaller and more efficient, when the manual transmissions became computerized and automated. Every five years, he traded in for a new one, carefully choosing each car's name according to the alphabet. Sloan was a curious and well-read citizen who cared deeply for his large and extended family and was generous with his time when help was needed.
