RYERSON o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-06-10 published
Stove maker got company cooking
Innovator steered Western Foundry Co. into supplying auto exhaust
manifolds
By Allison
LAWLOR
Tuesday,
June 10, 2003 - Page R5
An innovative Canadian businessman who transformed a small family
company that produced iron stoves into the world's supplier of
exhaust manifolds for cars and light trucks, has died. Dick
LEVAN
passed away in Brantford, Ontario, in late April. He was 68.
In 1961, Mr.
LEVAN joined the Western Foundry Co. Ltd., now called
Wescast Industries Inc., as a young engineer with little knowledge
about the foundry business. At the time, the company, which now
has more than 2,000 employees, had 32 employees who worked with
primitive equipment in run-down buildings in the small, southwestern
Ontario town of Wingham.
Fifty-eight years earlier, Mr.
LEVAN's maternal grandfather Richard
VANSTONE had been one of the first businessmen in Wingham to
buy five shares, valued at $100 each, in the new foundry. Today,
the LEVAN family is the company's major shareholder.
"It was his passion that has driven the growth of the company
for the past 42 years," said Mr.
LEVAN's son-in-law Edward
FRACKOWIAK.
"He made things happen. He didn't wait around for things to happen
to him."
Mr. FRACKOWIAK succeeded Mr.
LEVAN, who stepped down as the company's
chairman of the board in March. He was diagnosed with liver cancer.
In his early years with the company, Mr.
LEVAN faced several
challenges. In 1964, the same year he was elected president by
the board of directors, replacing his father William
LEVAN, the
company got a contract to manufacture radiators for the Toronto
Separate School Board. After a summer spent making the cast-iron
hot-water radiators, they were installed, but when they were
turned on, they leaked.
The company not only lost $64,000 replacing the radiators but
their credibility in the cast-iron heating business. But Mr.
LEVAN was determined to turn the company around. He steered the
company toward the auto industry and in the late 1960s it started
manufacturing auto parts. "He was a leader," said Clyde
McBAIN,
chairman of Winnipeg-based Ancast Industries Ltd. "He was a hard
driver. He was tough."
Mr. LEVAN found himself faced with another tough challenge in
1978 that could have forced the foundry into bankruptcy. Ford
Motor Co. recalled 65,000 Bronco transmission extensions that
year, according to Wescast. The foundry took partial responsibility
and worked with Ford to address the problem. As a result of the
recall, Mr.
LEVAN became determined to build quality control
into the foundry's production system.
"He capitalized on this low point," Mr.
FRACKOWIAK said, adding
that today the company has an enviable safety record. "I think
that was one of the remarkable things about Dick. When faced
with a critical issue he could do something about it."
By the early 1990s, the company was a major supplier of manifolds
for the Big Three auto makers. Under Mr.
LEVAN's guiding hand,
the company continued to grow over the next decade. Based in
Brantford, Wescast now operates seven production facilities in
North America. It also has a joint-venture interest in Weslin
Autoipari Rt., a Hungarian-based supplier of exhaust manifolds
and turbocharger housings for the European auto market.
Last year, Wescast announced that it had acquired Georgia Ductile
Foundries L.L.C., a privately held auto-parts maker also in the
cast-iron business, which manufactures suspension and brake components.
Richard LEVAN was born in New Rochelle, New York on May 30, 1934,
but grew up in the town of Arnprior, west of Ottawa. He attended
Trinity College School, a private school in Port Hope, Ontario,
and went onto study engineering physics at the University of
Toronto. He graduated in 1956 and two years later married Jane
RYERSON.
They had four children.
As a young engineer fresh out of school, Mr.
LEVAN went to work
for a refrigeration company in Brantford, Ontario, before moving
to Wingham to join Western Foundry at his father's urging. Known
as a demanding employer, Mr.
LEVAN was respected for his hard
work, directness and leadership abilities. He was someone who
had an ability to "cut to the chase," Mr.
FRACKOWIAK said.
An astute businessman, one of Mr.
LEVAN's favourite expressions
was, "Don't let your short-term greed get in the way of your
long-term greed."
Over the years, his good sense of humour and ability to laugh
at himself served him well. Just before an important meeting
in Flint, Michigan., with executives from General Motors Corp.,
Mr. LEVAN discovered he had forgotten his suit. A colleague came
to the rescue, offering to lend him an extra suit.
Mr. LEVAN arrived at the meeting the next day wearing the borrowed
suit, the pant legs just short of his ankles. When the General
Motors executives arrived, Mr.
LEVAN decided to make light of
the situation. "We had a lot of rain in Wingham last night,"
he told them.
Described as "fanatical about improvement," Mr.
LEVAN was always
looking for new ways to improve the company's products, which
meant talking to employees and visiting them on the foundry floor,
especially in the early years. On one such visit, an employee
approached Mr.
LEVAN complaining that he didn't have the right
tools for the job. Mr.
LEVAN went directly to the employee's
supervisor and suggested that the problem be corrected. The supervisor,
trying to play down the employee's complaints, told him the tools
were fine. After listening to the supervisor, Mr.
LEVAN looked
at him and said: "You have to give people good tools if you want
the job done properly."
Later, despite the company's success and his own personal wealth,
Mr. LEVAN remained unpretentious and at his core a small-town
family man.
"He liked to have the family around," said Mr.
FRACKOWIAK.
The
family not only worked together but often spent vacations together.
Several family members continue to work at Wescast, including
Mr. LEVAN's son William
LEVAN, who is the company's vice-president
of technology.
Outside work, Mr.
LEVAN golfed, fished and was an accomplished
pilot. He flew a Cessna 206 for years.
"Dick was never quiet," Mr.
McBAIN said. "He liked to have fun."
Mr. LEVAN served on several boards, including Trinity College
School, to which he donated generously. He also served as past-president
of the Canadian Foundry Association and as past director of the
American Foundrymen's Society. In Brantford and Wingham, his
philanthropy was well known at local hospitals, churches and
golf courses.
Mr. LEVAN, who died at his home in Brantford on April 29, leaves
his wife Jane, their four children Sally, Bill, Bruce and Ginny,
and nine grandchildren.
"He was more than a guy who knew business," Mr.
FRACKOWIAK said.
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