Douglas McCraven

Mr. Douglas “Doug” Milas McCraven, age 63, passed away peacefully and surrounded by family on Sunday, June 19, 2022 following a private battle with a terminal lung disease.The memorial service will be at 11 a.m. on Thursday, June 23, 2022, at Wolfe Funeral Home Chapel, with the Rev. Tony Caruso officiating. The family will speak to friends following the service.Born in Lake City, Florida, Doug was the eldest of the five sons of Albert Steve McCraven (1994) and Louise Self McCraven (2016). The family moved to Charlotte when Doug was six months old. At the age of 16, he joined his mother and his aunt and started working at Lance Inc. (now Campbell’s Inc.). His career at Lance spanned more than 45 years and, following various roles and promotions, he eventually served as the Director of Logistics. Doug was part of the fabric at Lance and was an unofficial ambassador of the company; gifting Lance “mixed boxes” to virtually everyone he came in contact with, especially around the holidays, and preaching to anyone who would listen about the superiority of Lance’s cookies and crackers to its competitors.Doug had a very full life outside of his logistics career. He loved taking care of his home and beautifully wooded two-acre yard. He spent countless crisp mornings and sunny afternoons cutting the grass, painting, planting trees, and piddling. His family referred to him as the “Professor of Piddling”. He could fix and build just about anything. In 2020, after retiring from Lance, he finished his attic, converting it to a playroom for his grandchildren. While he loved every blade of grass and inch of his home, his pride and joy were the three Japanese maple trees that he planted in his backyard. They are now over 15 feet tall and are illuminated with one of the best residential outdoor light displays east of the Mississippi.Doug’s smile was contagious, and he was an absolute joy to be around. He treated everyone he met with respect, and we don’t think he ever met a stranger. Any friend of Doug’s knew that they could count of him for anything, whether it be to borrow a tool, a helping hand with a project, bailing them out of jail or, in recent months, taking care of their horses. But any friend of Doug’s also knew they needed to stay on their toes as Doug was the ultimate prankster, and he had the creativity, patience, and execution to pull off elaborate and infamous pranks. One year, on April Fools’ Day, he swapped out the back pages of his neighbor’s newspaper with pages from the April 1 st newspaper that he had purchased the year before and saved for the occasion.Above all, Doug loved his blended family. He was a thoughtful, dependable, and loving husband, father and grandfather. He did the little things and the big things. He volunteered his help for any task frequently noting that he “was the lowest bidder” and doing anything and everything necessary to support them and to make sure they were safe. He taught them that anything could be accomplished with a little creativity and hard work.He is survived by his wife, Bozena Kucinic McCraven; his children, Denise McCraven and Rachel (Jordan) Temple; his brother, Scott McCraven; and his favorite people, his grandchildren, Cooper and Jack. He was preceded in death by his Father Albert, Mother Louise, Brothers Glen, James, and Jeff.Memorials may be made to https://ipffoundation.org/donate/Read Obituary