WARREN - John Rebhan accomplished remarkable things in a quiet way, a business acquaintance recalled Friday. The prominent Warren industrialist died Tuesday at 64 of a heart attack while vacationing in Florida.

''He was big,'' Scott Lewis, vice president of commercial real estate firm Edward J. Lewis Inc. in Warren, said of the owner of Warren Fabricating and Machining.

''He had multiple businesses and was a very successful self-made man, but he wasn't the kind of guy who went looking for attention. As big as he was, he lived sort of quietly.''

Lewis said he talked with Rebhan at a holiday party Dec. 23, just before Rebhan left for his Florida vacation to be with family.

''He was in very good spirits. He was very excited about leaving,'' he said.

Lewis said the two talked briefly about Rebhan's heart and how the industrialist was taking care of himself after undergoing major heart surgery in the last five years.

''He had stopped drinking altogether. He didn't drink any alcohol at the party,'' Lewis said.

Rebhan was a self-taught engineer by taking correspondence courses, Lewis recalled.

''He didn't have time to go to college. He was too busy building his businesses. He became a very good engineer,'' he said.

As of March, Warren Fabricating employed about 300 hourly and salaried workers at operations in Warren Township on Mahoning Avenue, Niles and Hubbard Township on Chestnut Ridge Road.

Warren Fabricating in 2005 was considering an expansion on Chestnut Ridge Road that would add 100 jobs. Area officials were shocked last March by a news report that the company might build a $500 million, 1,000 worker steel mill in Arkansas. Company officials later said the company decided not to expand anywhere.

Rebhan last year bought one of downtown Warren's most desirable properties - the former Trumbull Savings and Loan colonial-style bank building at High Street and North Park Avenue. It wasn't clear what he intended to do with the building.

Lewis remembered Rebhan as someone who liked to ''buy things that needed fixed.'' One was the mansion in Vienna that stood half-finished after Youngstown discount retailer Michael ''Mickey'' Monus was convicted of embezzlement. Rebhan bought the weather-damaged house in August 1996 in a bankruptcy sale.

Rebhan also owned and beautified an imposing mansion near the Trumbull Country Club on Warren's east side, one of the city's best-known houses.

Besides his business success with Warren Fabricating, Ohio Steel and others, Rebhan was prominent for his passion for speedboats and racing cars. He collaborated with famed speedboat racer and builder Reggie Fountain, as well as car racers at Sharon Speedway.

He left racing years ago but Lewis recalled talking with Rebhan about his career at the holiday party.

''He said several friends who did it with him had been killed,'' Lewis said.

lringler@tribtoday.com