Max Chamberlin

Before his death at 24 in a tragic accident, Max Chamberlin had spent a good deal of his life growing up and working at his father’s sign shop, Vital Signs in Verona, Wisconsin. Like a lot of kids who spend time in the family sign shop, he learned sign making on the fly—without really trying.

When you’re raised around a sign shop all the processes and techniques are familiar to you. You don’t have to wonder or be amazed by how gold leaf is laid — you got to try your hand at it when you were still in grade school.

“Making signs was just part of life for him,” says Mike. “He helped out whenever he was here and worked here during the summer while he was in school. He was always dabbling in paint, and I took him to some of the Letterhead meets. Max was a really good kid. He was an athlete—an all- state linebacker on a powerhouse high school football team that went undefeated for the four years that he was there. In his freshman year, in fact, they never allowed one point to be scored against them.”