Brother of local jeweler; founded computer business
Edward G. Mitchell was an accountant working for Shell Oil on the Suez Canal in Egypt when he and his brother, Alfred, made a life-changing decision.
They chose to come to the United States, sponsored by their mother's brother, Nicholas Lattof, who signed their immigration papers.
The brothers, whose last name at the time was Baghos, traveled by boat to New York in 1947.
"It took one whole month to get from Alexandria (Egypt) to New York," says Alfred Mitchell, now living in Sarasota, Fla. "The captain kept trying to get away from the mines embedded from World War II."
The brothers arrived in January, wholly unprepared for the conditions. It was the first time either of them had seen snow, and their shoes, made in Egypt, fell apart, Alfred Mitchell recalls.
The brothers settled near their uncle, planting roots in Arlington Heights, where both found success and the American dream.
That's also where they found a new last name, to better fit in with Americans, said Mr. Mitchell's nephew, Jim Mitchell.
"The joke is that once they got to Arlington Heights, they saw a street sign for Mitchell Avenue, and that's where they got the idea for their new name," Jim Mitchell said.
Family members have been reflecting on Mr. Mitchell's interesting background, of his road to this country and his many accomplishments once he arrived. The 40-year Arlington Heights resident, most recently of Peoria, Ariz., passed away Aug. 17. He was 85.
Family members say that while Alfred Mitchell followed in a long line of jewelers -- he was a sixth-generation jeweler -- and opened Mitchell's Jewelers in Arlington Heights, his brother stayed in accounting.
Edward Mitchell worked first for Firestone Tires before joining IBM in its data processing division.
"He could see that the industry was moving toward computers," says his daughter Natalie Kleefisch of Plainfield, "and he took his accounting training and applied it to that, before going to school at night at Northwestern (University)."
By the 1960s, Mr. Mitchell started his own business, Edward G. Mitchell & Co., renting office space in the former Arlington Market Shopping Center, where his daughters were keypunch operators.
"He had an IBM 1040 in our basement," says his daughter Gretchen Gullo of Park Ridge, of the large computer model, "where he taught operators how to use it."
Eventually, Mr. Mitchell would design computer systems for several large companies, ranging from Harley-Davidson to Allen-Bradley, both in Milwaukee.
When he wasn't working, Mr. Mitchell was an active congregation member at First Presbyterian Church of Arlington Heights, serving as a trustee and treasurer of its building program.
Mr. Mitchell and his wife, Dorothy, retired to Arizona, where he continued to work part time as a computer consultant, while also starting a real estate business.
Besides his two daughters and his brother, Mr. Mitchell is survived by four grandchildren, and his sisters, Yvonne (Nazir Habib) and Mary Takla. Services have been held.