Shelbyville, Indiana — March 28, 2005
A community remembers a man whose second chances became a mission to save others.
The city of Shelbyville lost another of its many outstanding citizens Thursday when Roland M. “Mac” McClanahan died at his home.
There will be no more of those numerous emergency runs to Major Hospital for Mac, who barely survived a massive heart attack in 1998.
On that nearly fatal evening of July 8, 1998, he was having dinner at Fiddler’s Three restaurant and saw some friends—not unusual for Mac, who had many. As he rose to greet them and took several steps forward, he collapsed.
“They said I was dead when I hit the floor,” McClanahan later recalled. It was his third heart attack. Only the quick actions and CPR knowledge of those nearby—along with a portable defibrillator carried by the ambulance crew that arrived four minutes later—saved his life.
According to his family, this was neither the first nor the last time his life would be extended by a defibrillator, a device that sends an electrical charge to restore a victim’s heartbeat.
After that life-defining experience, McClanahan made a conscious decision to do his very best to ensure that others would also have access to this effective machine.
He owned McClanahan Sales, a manufacturing-equipment representative firm specializing in automotive rebuilding equipment, and traveled extensively throughout the Midwest. He always held to the belief that “the customer is always right.” In the mid-1960s, he and his wife, Ruth, also owned Mary Carter Paint franchises in Indianapolis.
Mac was a joiner, active in countless organizations—among them the Automotive Booster Club of America, Murat Shrine, Scottish Rite, Masonic Lodge, Eagles Lodge, Shelbyville Lions Club, American Legion Post No. 70, Veterans of Foreign Wars No. 2695, and the Elks Club.
So when he set his sights on a new goal—to equip every Shelby County Sheriff’s unit with a portable defibrillator—he brought with him a rare combination of attributes: deep equipment knowledge, natural salesmanship, and decades of relationships built through service.
The Sheriff’s Department had begun outfitting some units with portable defibrillators in 1997, but the $3,000 devices were not always within budget. Mac stepped into that gap with characteristic determination.
In the end, Mac McClanahan’s legacy was not defined by the heart attacks he survived, but by the lives made safer because he refused to treat survival as a private gift. He turned gratitude into action—and action into a lasting community safeguard.