Born: April 30, 1938
Died: February 19, 2016
Stanford Snyder was born in Chicago, son of William Stanford Snyder and Martha Jenny Irwin Snyder. He grew up in Riverside, Connecticut and graduated from Brunswick School in Greenwich in 1956.
Stan attended Yale with the class of 1960 for one year, 1956-1957, then enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps. He served for 2 years aboard ships of the 6th fleet in the Mediterranean. He was discharged as a Corporal and returned to Yale in the fall of 1959 as a member of our class.
Stan was a resident of Trumbull, where he was basketball captain and also played on the football and baseball teams. He was an American Studies major and member of Delta Kappa Epsilon and Desmos. He roomed with Steve Hudson and Connie Shimer.
After Yale, Stan attended Columbia Business School and then began his remarkable career in the music business. He started at Columbia Records rising to VP of Marketing and National Director of Sales. He co-founded Cleveland International Records in 1977 releasing Meat Loaf’s “Bat Out of Hell.”
Stan was himself an accomplished musician, a unique jazz piano player. In his youth he had a band, Baby Boy Blues, and continued to play, occasionally performing at a Stamford pub.
Stan met Bridget Carroll in 1989. They married and were inseparable for the balance of his life. He died February 19, 2016, after a long illness.
Stan was survived by Bridget, his daughter Julie Pildner of Madison, Connecticut, his son Kyle Snyder of Boulder, Colorado and 3 grandchildren, Samuel Snyder of Boulder, and Gabrielle and Axel Pildner of Madison. He was also survived by his brother David of Oklahoma City and his former wife Jerry Steen, who remained a friend. In addition to his parents, he was predeceased by his sister Sue Johnson.
He and Bridget loved to travel and she recalled fondly their trips to Alaska, Switzerland and Ireland. Stan was also an avid tennis player. Bridget said Stan was a great storyteller, friendly and gregarious. “I believe,” she said “Stan did not have an enemy in the world.”
Steve Hudson, his former roommate, recalled Stan as, “a great piano player and an enthusiastic basketball player. While at Yale, we often went to New York City to listen to jazz at the clubs on 52nd Street. We also saw a few plays in Manhattan, after which we would stay at his Grandmother’s apartment at Riverside and 100th Street.”
At the Memorial Service for Stan on March 2, 2016, at Riverside Yacht Club, more than 100 friends attended, including many of his Desmos colleagues. Chris Cory delivered a eulogy quoting many society members and other friends.
Roger Clapp said, “Stan had great style, whether in conversation or playing the piano. Bob Zuckert wrote that Stan was “one of the best and most unique people I have known.” Mike Kane, Jack McCredie, Jon Saari and Clark Winslow also contributed Memorial tributes.
Chris Cory lauded Stan’s personal magnetism, expressing the hope that tributes by his old friends and classmates could help to restore the hole in Bridget’s heart from Stan’s last illness and his passing.
Robert G. Oliver