Stew Leonard's son's 'spirit' lives in new Norwalk swim school

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The Leonards are pictured in this family photo. From left to right: daughter Blake Leonard, father Stew Leonard Jr., son Stewie Leonard and mother Kim Leonard. Stewie died at 21 months in a drowning accident on Jan. 1, 1989.

Kim, Stew II and Stew III Leonard pose together in the 1980s.

NORWALK — Stewie Leonard was chasing a balloon when he fell in the pool.

"We had a whole bunch of adults out around our pool and other children," his father Stew Leonard Jr. recalled, 34 years later. "My wife thought I was watching my son and I thought my wife was watching my son."

Quickly, the family's 1989 New Year's Day celebration at their vacation home in St. Maarten turned into an unimaginable tragedy.

"We weren't aware he was in the pool. We ran all around the house. It was panic time," Leonard said. "In a matter of minutes, we found him floating face down in the water. We tried CPR. We rushed him to the hospital, but it was too late. He passed."

The Leonards, owners of the Norwalk-based grocery chain Stew Leonard's, transformed the pain of losing their 21-month-old son into a powerful mission to educate the community about water safety. More than 30 years later, that mission has culminated in the opening of a swim school in Norwalk in his honor.

"His spirit will be with us," Leonard said.

The school will teach pool safety and state-of-the-art, life-saving techniques — like how children can roll onto their back in the water — that could have helped Stewie, the family says.

"Now we are not only going to be able to walk the talk, we are going to be able to swim the talk," Leonard said.

Proceeds from the school will support the water safety foundation the couple formed in their son's honor.

"The swim school is a 501(c)3 so all our net profits will go outside to fund more swim lessons in under-served communities, so that's our goal," Kim Leonard said.

Stew and Kim Leonard created the Steward Leonard III Water Safety Foundation in 1990 to educate children and families about the importance of water safety.

"We’ve raised over $6 million so far; we then started giving the money away to a lot of needy organizations like the Boys and Girls club and YMCA," Leonard said. "What they did is they were providing free swim lessons for needy children in the community."

The Leonards believe they will be able to increase the amount of free swim lessons they provide from the profits of the swim school. Kim Leonard explained that the profits of the school will fund lessons in under-served communities.

"Right now we are giving ten thousand lessons away every year, that's how many lessons we are sponsoring, and with the success of the swim school we are hoping to double that," Stew Leonard Jr. said.

The pool is located at 55 Westport Ave. next to Stew Leonard's Wine and Spirits of Norwalk. Founded by the late Stew Leonard Sr., the family grocery store has seven locations in Norwalk, Danbury, Newington, East Meadow, N.Y., Farmingdale, N.Y., Yonkers, N.Y., and Paramus, NJ.

After Stewie's accident the Leonards said they noticed a lack books giving instructions to children about water safety, so they wrote "Stewie the Duck Learns to Swim."

"It's written for little kids, and it's written so that there are three instructions: learn to swim, wear a safety vest or some saving assistance, and the third is always have an adult watch you in the water," Stew Leonard Jr. said.

They have sold over 250,000 copies, and in 2020 they wrote a second book, "Swimming Lessons with Stewie the Duck."

The duck character from the book inspired the name and theme for the swim school.

Stewie the Duck Swim School has 500 lessons scheduled for its first full week, the Leonards said.

"We are really excited about it and so far the response has been overwhelming from the community," he said.

Lessons start for children at 6 months, which the Leonards said is an important time to introduce water to babies. Drowning is the leading cause of death for children ages 1 to 4, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

"You can teach a 6-month-old, just watch acclamation, you know blowing bubbles so that if they do fall in they don't suck water in," Stew Leonard Jr. said. "You can also teach them how to roll over from their stomach to their back and that's so critical because if our son was able to roll over from his stomach to his back he’d probably be with us today."