X-Ray Firm Ran With Integrity
Michael Rusnak, ran X-ray firm –Carole Beers Seattle Times Staff reporter
Michael Rusnak, longtime owner of Seattle’s North Pacific X-Ray Co., used to joke that he had no clients. That was because he considered people who bought X-ray products his permanent friends.
It went back to his integrity and attention to detail. He considered no machine-servicing request too small, and no person’s question insignificant.
“He was very personable, an easygoing man with a great sense of humor, honest and loyal to a fault. His work was impeccable. He stayed until the job was done. He helped quite a few chiropractors start businesses, extending credit and so on.
“The only thing he couldn’t stand was dishonesty, and someone not doing what they said they would.”
Born to Czech immigrants in Brownsville, Pa., he liked to study and to do the right thing morally. He didn’t miss a day of school in 12 years of education, and graduated in the top three of his high-school class in New York City.
During the Depression, he helped support his widowed mother and five siblings by selling newspapers on a New York street corner.
Wanting to be a mechanic, he enlisted in the Navy in 1943. But tests indicated he should be in the medical field, so he became a pharmacist mate. He helped deliver babies for many service wives. Later, stationed in San Diego, he studied to be an X-ray technician.
Mr. Rusnak spent the first 25 years after the war in charge of sales and service at Westinghouse Electric’s Los Angeles office.
Off hours he fished in the ocean, or hiked and fished in the Sierras.
When Seattle’s North Pacific X-Ray came up for sale in 1970, he bought it, and ran it until illness forced his retirement in 1995.
His worked completely absorbed him. He kept many machines running well past their prime, being one of a handful of people on the West Coast who could do that. And he took a great interest in the success of his client-friends.
“He won several awards from medical groups."
“He also enjoyed woodworking. He did all the finish work on the house he had built in Edmonds, and that woodwork was like satin.”
Contact Rusnak Chiropractic Table Repairs
Lynnwood, WA 98036
Mike Rusnak - (206) 310-0036
