Lars Anton Selen, 82, of Phoenix, Arizona, died at 10:18 a.m. May 18 at Lincoln Memorial Hospital, Phoenix.
 

A celebration of life gathering will be held from 3-5pm on Sunday July 16th at The North Mountain Brewing Company, 522 E, Dunlap Ave, Phoenix, Arizona.
 
Lars was born July 2, 1934 in Chicago, Illinois, to Birger and Sonja Selen of Fagersta, Sweden.  The family moved back to Sweden when Lars was two years old.  He grew up in Fagersta where he went to school, and later got an engineering degree from the Technical College in Orebro, Sweden.  Lars joined the Swedish coastal artillery in 1954 where he, among other duties, served as a frogman who located and retrieved mines in the Swedish archipelago.  On December 31, 1956 he married his high school sweetheart Mait Birgitta Bjorkman. Their son Mats was born two years later.  Lars worked for several steel companies in Sweden, and in 1968 Lars and his family immigrated to Oakville, Ontario, Canada where Lars became the North American operations manager for Stora Kopparberg, one of the biggest tool-steel producers in Sweden.  After two years in this position he started his own steel processing company called Canadian Steel Service

Lars sold Canadian Steel Service in 1975 and purchased a farm near Tweed, Ontario, where he and his family began raising Suffolk sheep.  Within five years he became an expert on sheep nutrition, consistently having the fastest gaining ram-lamb in the province, and was a featured writer in The Shepherd, a magazine for Canadian sheep farmers.  In 1984 the family sold the farm and Lars worked a number of jobs as a manufacturing operations consultant. In 1992 he and his wife moved to Youngstown, New York, and both became citizens of the United States, something Lars was extremely proud of.  By that time he had become interested in Computer Aided Design and Computer Aided Machining and became a North American expert in CAD/CAM – consulting, designing manufactured parts, and training end users of SmartCam software. He continued working at his consulting business, Malabi Southwest, until his death..

An avid hiker, Lars completed the “Rim to Rim” trek from one edge of the Grand Canyon to the other in one day on multiple occasions, the most recent in 2012. He also enjoyed hiking Shaw Butte which was near his home, riding his bicycle to hike nearby North Mountain, driving his motor scooter and working on his house.  He was known as a great storyteller and enjoyed getting the upper hand against whomever he considered had undue authority.  He was a positive influence in many people’s lives as a mentor, father, husband, grandfather, neighbor, friend and coworker.  He will be missed by many.

Lars Salen



 

He is survived by his wife, Birgitta Selen of Phoenix, Arizona; his son Mats Anton Selen and daughter-in-law Aledria Lyn Selen of Tuscola, Illinois; his grandchildren James Anton Selen, of Dallas, Texas; Emily Isenbarger of Murfreesboro, Tennessee; Catherine Selen of Chicago, Illinois; and Aledria Leithliter Cooper of San Francisco, California. He has two great-granddaughters, Julie and Kate Isenbarger. 
 
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to The Humane Society.

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