WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – The obituary for Stephen Downey, who died Dec. 13 at age 71, was tucked on Page D2 of the Dec. 15 Journal & Courier.

The 19-line death notice Downey’s family wrote appeared without a photo, a few relatively vague references to an Army stint, an anonymous Lafayette employer and unnamed siblings, and, really, no clue that it marked the passing of a West Side and Purdue institution.

“I had friends who knew I knew Stephen mention it to me, like, ‘Is that …?’” said Gay Barnett, who met Downey in 2017 as a volunteer working with Tippecanoe Adult Guardian Services. “I’d say, ‘Yes. Yes, it is.’ But I can see why most people didn’t notice.”

Barnett always called him Stephen, because that’s how he’d introduced himself to her two years ago. It was how his family, who reconnected in recent years, called him by name during visits to the Indiana Veterans Home, where he’d moved two years ago.

“But maybe more people would have noticed if (his obituary) had included that one other thing,” Barnett said. “Just put in there, ‘State Street Steve.’”

State Street Steve was how several generations of Purdue students, faculty and staff knew Downey, a quiet, but ever-present homeless man who for three decades hung out in West Lafayette’s Village area, typically along the street that lent him his nickname.

“When he was sitting on a bench along State Street, he would wait to see if he could draw eye contact,” said Kurt Harker, a PATH (Projects for Assistance in Transition from Homelessness) Street Outreach worker with Valley Oaks Health. “Then he simply replied, ‘Gotta quarter?’ As time went on, he didn’t even have to ask. Students, staff and faculty would just give him a quarter, a dollar, even food.”

Downey had been gone from State Street, for the most part, since 2017.

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In January of that year, Tasha Mann, a Battle Ground woman who worked in a State Street business near where Downey kept his makeshift camp, found him sick and nearly frozen. His limbs were swollen, his hands and fingers were absolutely white and unable to bend. Mann said she considered him a friend, buying him lunch from time to time and always remembering to bring him a container when she made chicken and noodles at home. But that didn’t mean Downey listened to her pleas to get medical help.

When Mann finally persuaded Downey to allow her to get him to the hospital – “It took everything I had, because he really didn’t want to go,” she said – she started a GoFundMe.com account to raise money to get Downey a place to stay and some household essentials when he got out. She raised more than $7,000, much of it from Purdue alumni.

At some point during a 41-day stay at Franciscan Health Lafayette East, hospital officials called on Tippecanoe Adult Guardian Services, which called in Barnett. Barnett figured out that Downey was a veteran, which cleared the way for a place in the Indiana Veterans Home, where he had a warm room, three guaranteed meals a day and clothes and sundries, some of which were paid for out of the GoFundMe haul that Mann turned over to the guardian agency.

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Barnett also squeezed out a few details about his childhood in Decatur, Illinois, which led her to high school yearbooks, which led her to Downey’s siblings. His family, Barnett found, had called in private investigators but had long ago given up on their search for their brother, who they figured had died. (Barnett said Downey’s family remains private about their brother, who was buried during a family service in Illinois.)

“Stephen probably even would have admitted that he was happy,” Barnett said about the past two years. “But he always talked about going back on the street. But I think he was, I don’t know, satisfied, maybe is the word. I think he appreciated what he had now, compared to the ‘back then’ he had.”

Harker said he’d seen that back then for Downey, in what he described as inhumane living conditions inhabited by a man who resisted attempts to, as Harker put it, “try it inside.” Harker said he considered it the ultimate challenge to break through to Downey, who wasn’t much of a talker. Harker said he never heard Downey complain about his lot in life, “which I found astounding.”

When Mann got Downey to the hospital – a move that, by all accounts, saved his life – Harker said he’d been working with Lafayette Transitional Housing Services and the city of Lafayette to find Downey a place to live. The opportunity at the Indiana Veterans Home turned out to be even better, Harker said, and he had a crew take down his camp.

“Purdue students were almost always kind and generous to Steve,” Harker said. “When we cleaned out his camp, I found a box with hundreds of gift cards – McDonald’s, mostly.”

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Barnett said Downey didn’t demand much at the Veterans Home, where he was able to get care for some serious conditions. She said he enjoyed trips to Mackey Arena to see the Purdue women’s basketball team play, excursions to Walmart and sitting in on the occasional bingo session.

Downey had two conditions about moving inside, Barnett said. 1. No one could cut his hair. 2. Same went for his beard.

“Not even a trim,” Barnett said.

So, Barnett said, when she and her husband took Downey out to eat – “He was a big, big fan of Panda Express,” she said – people still recognized State Street Steve.

“I don’t know, but it made me feel really good about our community in a way,” Barnett said. “Especially when we were in West Lafayette, going somewhere near campus, people would come up to Stephen. They wanted to know where he’d been. How he was doing. … Stephen was still quiet about it. But you could tell people wanted him to know they’d been watching for him.”

Mann said she still pops open screen shots she saved of the comments people made when they chipped in a few bucks to help Downey in 2017. Several mention how they might not have had quarters every time for State Street Steve when they were undergrads, but that they could help now.

“I look at them and just think, ‘Wow,’” said Mann, who continued to check in on Downey at the Veterans Home. “He affected so many people by just being around and being who he was. … I was just glad the last couple of years that Steve wasn’t hungry, he wasn’t cold and he had people looking out for him.”

Harker said he learned a lot about earning trust of those living homeless by delivering on promises he made and easing into efforts to get them into something more permanent.

"Steve taught me how to extremely patient and persistent in doing so," Harker said. "I've had numerous homeless folks tell me that their biggest fear is that they will die 'out there alone.' Steve came very close to that, but because of the support he received — especially from his guardian — his life did not end that way. In some ways, I think Purdue misses him. I considered him a friend."

Barnett said she was a bit surprised to get the call this week, more than a month after Downey died. (Harker shared the news last week with a handful of housing advocates after asking about Downey during a visit to another Indiana Veterans Home resident.) But she said she was glad to get it, if it meant completing a key bit of biography missing from his obituary in December – letting the community that knew him all this time know what had happened.

“Thanks for asking about Stephen,” Barnett said. “Thanks for checking on State Street Steve.”

Reach Dave Bangert at 765-420-5258 or at dbangert@jconline.com. Follow on Twitter: @davebangert.