Leonard Raymond Smith, 73, Topeka, died Monday, March 5, 2001, at a Topeka hospice.
Mr. Smith founded Midwest Machine Works in 1960 and served as co-owner and president in 1994, when the business was sold to Krupp in Essen, Germany. Mr. Smith served in the U.S. Navy Occupational Forces from 1945 to 1947. He completed the Great Lakes Naval engineer and refrigeration school and was a machinist mate refrigeration mechanic. He later served a machinist apprenticeship at Santa Fe Railroad and was a maintenance machinist at Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. from 1950 to 1960.
He was born Nov. 6, 1927, in Topeka, the son of Eva Melvina Newman and Harold M. Smith Sr. He had lived in Topeka all his life. Mr. Smith was past president of the North Topeka Kiwanis Club, a former member of the Topeka West Rotary Club, past president of the Topeka chapter of the Society for Preservation of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America and a former member of the Topeka Symphony Chorus. He was a former director of the Seabrook Congregational Youth Choir, a member of the First Congregational Church and an official master gardener through the Kansas State Extension Service.
He married Dorothy Merrifield. They divorced. He married Carol J. Sample on Nov. 3, 1974, in Lawrence. She survives, of the home.
Survivors also include four sons, Ronald R. Smith, Indianola, Iowa, Mark W. Smith, Eskridge, Kevin L. Smith, Maple Hill, and Terry D. Smith, Irving, Texas; a daughter, Deanna L. Piazza, Simi Valley, Calif.; two sisters, Maxine E. Hutton and Arlene E. Metzger, both of Topeka; a brother, Eugene W. Smith, Bonner Springs; nine grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.
A memorial service will be at 1:30 p.m. Thursday at Parker-Price Mortuary. Burial will be in Memorial Park Cemetery with military honors by a Fort Riley detail. Mr. Smith will lie in state from 1 to 8:30 p.m. today at the mortuary where the family will receive friends from 6:30 to 8 p.m. today.
The family suggests memorials to the Topeka Rescue Mission, P.O. Box 8350, Topeka, 66608; Midland Hospice, 200 S.W. Frazier Circle, Topeka, 66606; The Salvation Army, P.O. Box 599, Kan., 66601; or Cleft Palate-Cranial Facial Clinic, 6-296 Moos Tower, School of Dentistry, 515 S.E. Delaware St., University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minn., 65455.
