KNIGHTDALE —Whether they worked with him, went to church with him, or knew him as a friend, Stan Whitt made a difference.

And so on a sunny Saturday, about 150 of his friends and relatives — his wife Ellen, children Meredith, 14, and Eric, 17, sister and brother-in-law Becky and Rich Hutchison —gathered at the Wil-Mar Golf course for the first Stan Whitt Memorial Classic. The golf tournament was to raise money to fight pancreatic cancer that killed their friend who died in February.

His minister, Hunter Preston of St. James United Methodist Church, said Whitt was a Christian witness.

His friends Steve Betts and Milburn Holbrook, who organized the tournament, said he was easy-going and not judgmental. They recalled meeting him at church, playing with him on the church softball team and working with him on Hurricane Floyd relief efforts in Kinston.

“After going on a trip with him, you felt you knew him your whole life,” said Holbrook. “It wasn’t anything he expressed, but this feeling you had.”

Holbrook’s wife Denise remembered her friend as sincere and funny – with a dry wit. Their children grew up together.

They and the others worked hard to put on the golf tournament, securing sponsors, and items for auction and door prizes.

“We wouldn’t have been able to get through this and continue,” said Whitt’s wife Ellen of her friends from St. James who ran the tournament. “They’re our family. …I personally think that Stan’s death, trying to make sense of it, and honor his memory – that’s where this comes from.”

Martha Fletcher, a close friend of Ellen’s, remembered Stan working hard to educate people about Pancreatic Cancer, a leading cause of cancer death. She secured prizes from 65 local businesses.

“I try to do what I can to help out,” said Whitt’s friend Skip Bonner, who signed up sponsors, auction items, designed and made signs for the tournament. A wooden sign with Whitt’s name written in script was designed to match his signature, said Bonner

Craig Sandras, Mark Janey, Evan Dean, Dale Leeson, Tim Janey and Rob Saferight, of Roanoke, came down for the day. They were friends of Whitt’s from work when he and Ellen lived in Roanoke, Virginia.

An avid golfer, Whitt played golf with his buddies every year, even the year he was diagnosed, just a month before he died, recalled Denise Holbrook. Her husband went along with them last year.

His friends raised about $5,500 from the event.

All his friends that worked hard to put on the tournament and those who remembered him by playing came through for a man who always came through for others.

“He was there if you needed him,” said Denise Holbrook.