Stanley Bender, 69, Jeweler Who Practiced `Show Business'

Stanley Philip Bender, who owned Bender's Creative Jewelers in Ballard and the University District for four decades, had a saying. In fact, he had several sayings.

"This is show business," he would tell his young children when they worked in his store on Saturdays. "You put on a smile, greet your customers, make them feel like a million bucks."

He also advised his children and others to get "cacky-macky" - his words for confident-and-chatty - "so that after 20 minutes a customer feels he has known you all his life."

The sayings stuck with his daughter, Shellie Lavaris of Bellevue.

"I teach special-education students in Bellevue Schools, and treat them the same way," she said. "I make them feel important. It's good in any situation. It's advice for life."

Mr. Bender died Wednesday (Aug. 26) of Parkinson's disease. He was 69.

Born in Seattle to Latvian immigrant Max Bender and wife, Dorothy Bender, he graduated from Garfield High School in 1946, studied business for two years at the University of Washington, then worked as a mechanic in the Navy in Seattle.

In the early 1950s, he apprenticed at his father's jewelry shop, Burt's Credit Jewelers at Sixth Avenue and Pine Street. In 1957, he opened Bender's Creative Jewelers at 4534 University Way N.E.

He opened a branch store in Ballard a few years later and put his sons to work. Mr. Bender did much of the design work on jewelry until a few years ago, when the University Way store closed.

He was diagnosed with Parkinson's 16 years ago and began turning more work over to his family. However, he retained ownership of the business.

Mr. Bender garnered headlines in 1983 for winning an $80,000 judgment against the city of Seattle in a false-arrest case dating to 1978. It was found that a burglar, trying to get his own sentence reduced, falsely claimed Mr. Bender purchased three known stolen rings from the burglar; Mr. Bender was playing in a golf tournament in Olympia at the time.

Mr. Bender had been quite a skier, and also enjoyed traveling to Seaside, Ore., with his family each summer. He was honoring the time he had met his wife of 20 years, Sharlene Cohn Bender, when both were in their teens. She died in 1971.

His other passion was Boston terrier dogs. His parents had owned them. He carried on the tradition, buying a new pup the Sunday following the death of the previous dog.

"Sunday was his only day off," his daughter said. "He'd come home from work, eat a huge dinner, then fall asleep on the sofa with a Boston terrier on his chest."

Other survivors include his children Scott and Steve Bender, both of Seattle; his mother of Seattle; and three grandchildren.

Services have been held. Remembrances may go to Parkinson's Disease Association, Neurology RG-27, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195; or to Kline Galland Home, 7500 Seward Park Drive S., Seattle, WA 98118.