Stevenson plays his ukelele before an audience. (Source: Peta Lewis)
Russ Stevenson, a prominent member of Oriental’s boating and arts communities, died Feb. 23 at age 93. His daughter Peta Lewis said he was in a New Bern nursing home after suffering a fall and contracting pneumonia.
Born in South Africa on March 3, 1932, he emigrated in 1980 to Gladstone, Michigan, where he, his wife Yvonne June Stevenson, and two of his children, Vaughan Stevenson and Peta Lewis, became citizens after five years.
Russ Stevenson poses for he camera while wearing a bit of color. (Source: Peta Lewis)
He was transferred to Michigan by Marbach Industries, the company he worked for as a mechanical engineer in South Africa.
Two of his children, Cheryl Worth and Grant Stevenson, continue to live in South Africa.
While in Michigan, Stevenson spent nine years building a boat with his son Vaughan, said his daughter.
The couple moved to Oriental after his retirement about 1995. Yvonne died in 2017.
“He was looking for a place to build these boats,” Lewis said. “When he went to Oriental he was told (by the real estate agent) to go to the bridge and look around, and ‘either you will like it or you won’t.’ He liked it.”
Russ Stevenson smiles in a Scottish Tam O’Shanter. (Source: Peta Lewis)
Stevenson was known throughout Oriental as a sailor. Lewis said he logged 43,000 miles sailing in the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans as well as the Mediterranean Sea.
He and Yvonne once started a trip to navigate the globe when their craft ran aground in Tahiti, forcing them to abandon that plan. Back in Oriental, he continued tinkering with smaller boats that he sailed locally.
Russ was known for his affability and charm. He was a lover of music who could often be found at local musical venues and was an avid member of the UHOOs, an Oriental-based ukulele band for which he played a soprano ukulele and sometimes dressed in outrageous costumes.
Stevenson showing his chops with an ice cream cone. (Source: Peta Lewis)
At a performance of the UHOOs (Ukelele Hoalhas of Oriental), Stevenson has some fun in a mock Hawaiian skirt and coconut brassier. (Source: Facebook)
Melanie Hoefler, a friend who often drove him to appointments and events, said Stevenson was a great dancer and was quite the ladies’ man.. “He was a great dancer,” she said. “He used to dance with all the women in town and give them all kinds of kisses and hugs. Most men didn’t get up and dance, but Russ got up and danced.”
She said he called her every morning to “ask me if I had my coffee yet. He was just great.”
He was also known to hone his acting chops at the town’s community arts organization, the Old Theater.
He wrote about it in an article in The County Compass in 2022: “Prior to moving to Oriental after retiring, I had no interest in the theater in any shape or form. Little did I know what an important role it would play in my retired life. … The Old Theater became a very important part of my life. I got interested in acting and met so many people through performances and selling tickets in the box office.”
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. March 14 at the Oriental United Methodist Church, where Stevenson was an active member, at 404 Freemason St. (Photo from Facebook)
Old Theater President Mary Taylor said Stevenson brought her into the group. Eight years ago, “He was playing cards with some of the board members and I just happened to be there and they invited me to play cards.” Soon she decided to try the theater out for herself.
“I just can’t say enough about his love of the theater,” she said. “And that love was reciprocated. His death was devastating to all of us.”
Russ Stevenson takes himself a little less than seriously, wearing oversized sunglasses at an Oriental park (Source: Facebook)
Per Erichsen, a neighbor, said Stevenson was the first person he met when he moved to Oriental from Philadelphia in 2004. “They were very good neighbors,” he said. “They were just wonderful people.”
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. March 14 at the Oriental United Methodist Church, where Stevenson was an active member, at 404 Freemason St.
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