As the sun set over San Francisco on Wednesday, locals and tourists alike traveled to the city’s flagship Apple Store on Stockton to pay their respects to the man who helped shape it all.
Genaro Nollan came to the Apple Store with a sense of duty—and a dozen packages of Post-It notes. “I heard about it, and I had to come down,” he said, adding a notepad to the small shrine accumulating outside the store’s glass window. “We had to show Steve how we felt.”
Thanks to his contributions, the normally-pristine glass windows of the Stockton store were covered in Post-Its from mourners and passers-by. Apple customers from all walks of life have stopped to pay their respects by writing or sketching. “He was a different kind of CEO,” said Nollan. “He seems to really care about his products and his customers.”
A stranger, overhearing our conversation about Nollan’s Post-It offerings, looked up from the Post-It he had been writing on. “Thank you,” he said to Nollan. “You have brought a lot of people together tonight.”
Meanwhile, from the rear of the crowd, Lynn Pagazzini stepped forward and used her iPad to snap a photo of the scene, then shut its Smart Cover and started pushing her way through the mourners and reporters to pick up a marker and a Post-It. She stuck the note to her iPad and began to write.
“I just needed to pay my respects to the great visionary of our generation. I have had a love affair with Apple for 20 years,” Pagazzini said, before glancing into the foggy San Francisco evening. “The sky is definitely dimmer tonight.”
