Laurence E. “Larry” Steadman, 70, formerly of Duxbury and Boston, died on March 17, at Windermere House in Chicago, Ill. Mr. Steadman graduated valedictorian from Falls City High School, Falls City, Neb. before attending Oberlin College on a full scholarship. Returning to Nebraska in 1959, after earning his B.A., he soon became marketing director for Hornady Manufacturing Co., Grand Island. He wrote “Hornady Handbook of Reloading,” an almost instant best seller. Outside of work, Mr. Steadman was an active actor, director and board member of the Grand Island Little Theatre and co-founder of a foreign film society, Cinema 2.{sidebar id=1}

In 1968, Mr. Steadman was elected to the Grand Island School Board, but resigned to travel to Boston to begin his studies at the Harvard Graduate School of Business, from which he graduated in 1970 with high distinction. He was a Baker Scholar at HBS, and he received his Doctor of Business Administration degree from Harvard in 1976.

At this time, Mr. Steadman was presented with a unique opportunity to go to Tehran as an assistant professor at the Iran Center for Management Studies. Teaching corporate finance and capital markets in this Harvard-affiliated Iranian graduate institution, he helped develop an M.B.A. program to train Iranian and international managers. Three years later in 1979 he was evacuated with other Americans after the first seizure of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, following the Shah’s departure.

In Boston, he accepted a position with the Cambridge Research Institute and in 1981 co-founded Steadman-Coles, Inc. of Boston with Ronald Coles which was a general management consulting firm, with clients that included AT&T, Aetna, US West, Motorola, Data General and Fidelity. Mr. Steadman served as president until the company closed in 1995.

Mr. Steadman then relocated to Cincinnati, Ohio and served as associate professor of management at Thomas More College and as an adjunct faculty member at Miami and Xavier Universities. He retired and moved to Chicago, Ill., in 2003. An avid reader and music lover, he was a supporter and member of the Lyric Opera of Chicago and an active as well as the youngest member of Chicago’s Oldest Men’s Book Club. He was himself writing a novel titled, “The Admiral of Hyde Park” at the time of his death.

Mr. Steadman leaves three sons, Christopher of New Lebanon, N.Y., Geoffrey of Brighton, and David, formerly of Duxbury, a DHS 98 graduate, currently living in Clinton, N.Y., and a brother, Dennis of Lakeland, Tenn.

Services were held at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Grand Island, Neb. Burial was private at Prairie Union Cemetery in Stella, Neb., where Mr. Steadman was born June 28, 1937, to the late Melvin and Mabel Howell Steadman.

In lieu of flowers, gifts in his memory can be made to 98.7 WFMT, 5400 N. St. Louis Avenue, Chicago, Ill. 60625-4698, The Oberlin Alumni Fund, Office of Development, Bosworth Hall, 50 West Lorain Street, Oberlin, Ohio, 44074, or the Grand Island Little Theatre Capital Campaign, 3180 W. US Highway 34, Grand Island, Neb., 68801.{sidebar id=6}