worked with numerous schools and SID's and was an exhibitor at a number of CoSIDA Workshops over the years.
Filmore died Sunday Dec. 23rd after a battle with lung cancer. He was 60. He graduated from Evangel with a journalism degree in 1976 and began working as the school's sports information director the next fall.
He worked for the Crusaders until this winter when health problems forced him to stop.
"It's a sad day for us, that's for sure," Evangel athletic director David Stair said.
"We knew that he had a very serious situation, but we all expected he might go through some chemotherapy and at least have some more time, whether it was months or years. We all had hope, and I think his family did, too."
After graduating from Lake County High School in 1966, Fillmore served in the U.S. Army and spent 13 months in Vietnam.
He was the district information director for the NAIA from 1985 to 1993 and became the Heart of America Athletic Conference's SID from 1988 to 2003.
"It's just going to be a tremendous loss to not only Evangel but the entire conference," HAAC commissioner Larry Lady said Monday. "He was a wealth of information, a storehouse of information about the conference."
Fillmore was honored by the NAIA with the association's top award for sports information directors, the Clarence "Ike" Pearson Award, in 1999.
Evangel women's basketball coach Leon Neal said Fillmore hated the extra attention and that it was a chore for Stair to convince Fillmore to go to the awards banquet.
"Recognition things were never really big with him," Neal said. "That was hard for him, going to the banquet."
What came easy was the hard work he put into the athletic department. Neal credits Fillmore for putting in extra hours to help Neal be named to the NAIA All-America basketball team for Evangel in 1978.
"Dave was a hardworking man," Neal said. "He put a lot of time into Evangel athletics. When you talk about Evangel athletics, you have to talk about David Fillmore. He's the one that put us on the map."
Fillmore was inducted into Evangel's sports Hall of Fame in 2007.
Fillmore began working at Evangel at the same time Steve Jenkins took over the men's basketball program as head coach. Jenkins said Fillmore poured countless hours into the program, digging through old newspaper clippings and school archives to count rebounds in box scores for the record books.
"I can't say enough about him," Jenkins said. "He was a servant. I don't know how you're going to replace that."
Stair said he expects the university to honor Fillmore at a basketball game when school is back in session.
"There will be many, many people that have fond memories of him and also know that we've got a big hole to fill," Stair said.
The school will start plans to find a replacement for Fillmore after the holidays, Stair said.
Fillmore is survived by his wife, Patricia, and his daughter, Deanna Brady, who graduated from Evangel in 2003.
Shanahan passed away suddenly Sunday, Dec. 28. He worked with numerous schools and SID's and was an exhibitor at a number of CoSIDA Workshops over the years.
His hard work and dedication gave many schools the opportunity to produce quality work and was one of the easiest vendors I ever had the pleasure of working with.
As dedicated as he was to his company and the schools he served, he was more dedicated to his family. His son Joe and wife Mary worked with Mike and plan to continue his work.