Lodi philanthropist Ivan Suess passes away at 91
Ivan Suess, a longtime Lodian who relatives and friends said was involved in just about any goings-on in town, passed away last weekend at the age of 91 from congestive heart failure and pneumonia.
“My dad was the hardest working man I knew,” Kerry Suess said. “He was literally involved in everything in Lodi.”
Born in Alberta, Canada in 1929, Ivan Suess and his family moved to Lodi in 1941. He graduated from Lodi High School in 1947 and attended Delta College and San Francisco’s Bethany Bible College before enlisting in the Air Force in 1950.
Upon returning to Lodi, he worked for the RCA-Victor Company
from 1954 to 1964, then owned Ivan’s Clothing for Boys until 1978.
Ivan Suess obtained a real estate license in 1977, and after closing the store, became an agent with Katzakian & Schaffer Realtors. He obtained a real estate brokers license in 1982, and a year later formed Schaffer Suess & Boyd Realtors with Ben Schaffer and Ken Boyd.
When not working, Kerry Suess said his father was involved in a variety of civic and philanthropic groups, including the Lodi Kiwanis and Rotary clubs, Lodi United Way, the Greater Lodi Leadership Prayer Breakfast Committee, and the LOEL Foundation, among others.
He said his father counseled couples, donated or discounted clothing from his store to the children of missionaries that passed through town, and would take missionary trips to Mexico to help the less fortunate.
Kerry Suess said he believed his father’s commitment to service stemmed from growing up with next to nothing, and he wanted to help others live better lives.
“He appreciated the ability he had to (give back),” he said. “He was a very good Christian, and if he ever felt there was a need and there was something he could do about that need, he would do it.”
Aside from working and serving the community, his father also liked to have a good time and get others to laugh, dance and sing, Kerry Suess said.
Ivan Suess emceed “tons” of weddings, he said, played the trumpet and tuba, and bought
thousands of dollars worth of karaoke equipment to take to senior centers and entertain residents.
“He had a very outgoing personality,” Kerry Suess said. “I think he not only wanted to share his talent, but just get people to sing and enjoy themselves. Everyone who knew him loved him, because of his commitment to the Lodi community.”
Ivan Suess was the oldest of seven, and younger brother Kelly Suess said he was not always the boisterous personality Lodians came to know and love.
While his brother participated in high school band and other extra curricular activities, he was a quiet person growing up. He was also the smallest senior in Lodi High’s Class of ‘47, but grew four inches tall between graduation and the time he finished college.
Ivan Suess met his wife Wilda while he was in the Air Force, and Kelly Suess said it was during his service that his brother came out of his shell.
He and his brother were very close, and even cochaired the Tokay High School Bond Committee.
“There had not been a bond issue on the ballot here in about 20 years,” Kelly Suess said. “What was so great about the campaign, was that every store downtown painted their windows shut in favor of the bond. We even had a parade down School Street for it, and in the end, it was elected by more than 75%.”
How the family came to live in Lodi from the plains province of Alberta was an interesting story, Kelly Suess said.
Their father was a native Lodian, and their mother was from Clements. The couple dated in the early part of the 20th Century, but their father moved to Canada around 1917 to try his hand at farming. Their mother went to Alberta to visit her sister and was able to find their father and rekindle the romance.
They were married and had all seven children before returning to Lodi in 1941.
“He was just a giving person,” Kelly Suess said. “It seemed like he was always involved something. He was generous, and just a good brother.”
In the 1990s, Ivan Suess lost his real estate partners to cancer, and he operated the company for a number of years before teaming up with Randy Snider as SSB Realtors. The rebranded company became the largest real estate firm based solely in Lodi with more than 60 agents at one time. The company was eventually sold to RE/MAX Gold in 2006.
Snider said Ivan Suess had been ready to retire for a number of years, but when Schaffer and Boyd both passed at different times, he decided to keep working.
“Ivan loved to travel,” Snider said. “But you can’t really do that and run a business by yourself. He eventually put the word out that he was looking for a partner, and one of his agents asked if I was interested.”
While Ivan Suess specialized in residential real estate, Snider was more involved with commercial properties. But he was intrigued at the idea of partnering with a man who was well-loved throughout the community.
He said Ivan Suess liked to give his agents incentives at work, such as rewarding points for attending meetings or making sales. The points were then used for prizes at the annual company Christmas party.
“He loved to shop too,” Snider said. “He would buy things throughout the year, always looking for deals or sales, and then the agents could use their “points” to buy those items at the Christmas party. Some of the items were pretty bizarre, but someone could have used 50 points to buy a coffee pot, or something like that.”
Snider added that Ivan Suess was not only generous, but dedicated to his family. He described Ivan Suess’ marriage to Wilda as a “real love story.”
“He was very generous,” Snider said. “He was one of the pillars of the community. Everybody knew who he was, and everybody admired him.”
Henrietta Van Dyk, association executive for the Lodi Association of Realtors, said Ivan Suess was a major proponent of charities, and instrumental in creating the organization’s annual Christmas fundraiser, the Can Tree Charity.
Association members would collect aluminum cans and create Christmas trees in the parking lot to raise money for local charities, she said. Over time, the event transformed into the association’s Can Opener event, in which cans were still collected, but no tress are created. Rather, the association plays games and offers prizes to raise funds for charities.
Van Dyk said despite the COVID-19 pandemic last year, the association was able to raise $25,000.
“He was a kind soul who just loved people,” she said. “If you’re going to be in real estate you have to love people. He was just a kind soul, and a warm person.”
Kerry Suess said his father went into semi-retirement since the sale of his company, but remained active on many local boards and committees.
One of those was the LOEL Foundation board of directors, of which he served from 1995 to the day he passed.
“Ivan was like family,” LOEL Center director Tracy Williams said. “He was also what I like to call a ‘silent giant.’ He did things on the downlow, but he was so passionate about who we are, what we do and who we serve. He was a bright light who always had a smile and a positive attitude.”
Williams said Ivan Suess emceed about 90% of the center’s events over the last 20 years, and was the “in-house entertainment” as he led the annual Christmas Lunch Sing-ALong, hosted every Senior Talent Night and a number of karaoke nights.
She said he had a deep personal connection to the center, because he was not only a senior later in life, but his family grew up on the property decades ago.
The house the Suess family called home once stood on what is now the LOEL Center’s rear parking lot, she said, and if anyone needed historical information about Lodi, Ivan Suess was the person to contact.
Ivan Suess was also a huge advocate for the center’s Meals on Wheels program, Williams said. He hated the fact many seniors were placed on a waiting list to eat — sometimes as many as 75 at a time — and he spearheaded efforts to obtain additional funding so no senior was waiting for food.
“He’s one of the reasons I came to LOEL,” Williams said. “You could always count on Ivan for an uplifting comment, smile or hug. He and Wilda would come to lunch every now and then and he would sit at different tables talking to all in attendance. He will be greatly missed.”