BRENT MARTINBrent Martin, a well-known trader in the Lincolnshire town of Cleethorpes, died on 24 January, 2009, aged 65.
Mr Martin passed away at the Diana, Princess of Wales Hospital in Grimsby after a short illness.
He lived over his Sea View Street trading premises, Brent Electronics and Communications, a company he established in 1974.
During that time he had provided a wide range of people – including the police and local councils – with bespoke security systems such as CCTV.
He was a much-loved brother to Goxhill resident Judith Masters, and fiancé to Marie Batchelor, from Grimsby.
Judith said: "He was passionate about seeing how things worked, always dismantling engines, which were all over the place.
"Our dad was in the air force, so we lived with our mum and grandparents. He also had a passion for flying, which I think came from dad.
"We even got a complaint from the local council because of all the different electronic equipment put on the house because of all his experiments!
"He was a great older brother – almost like a second dad."
His fiancée Marie met him through friends more than 40 years ago.
"He was quite a strong character, and he loved his car," she said. "He was a generally happy person, and always had a joke for people. He was always there for me whenever I needed anything."
Cousin Colin Partis was a former commercial photographer at the Grimsby Telegraph. Mr Martin came to his aid after they went hunting for ghosts for the paper in the 1960s.
"We were investigating a poltergeist in Grimsby, and he helped us by creating CCTV, which you didn't really have at the time," he said.
"Together we created the East Lindsey Metaphysical Society (ELMS), and carried out a number of investigations."
He said Mr Martin also had affiliations with the Sea View Street Traders' Association and the Freemasons, in Horncastle.
A colleague at Brent Electronics, Sue Smith, said: "We used to have a good laugh. It was more about the customers than making a profit."
Another colleague, Barbara Bailey, said: "He was unfailingly pleasant, a pleasure to deal with, and a person of integrity. People had the highest regard for him. He will be irreplaceable and missed."
He was also survived by his brother, Nigel, and sister, Jane.
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