When Kempton Urban first connected with Chris Canty 15 years ago, he didn’t expect the two to become family.

“Because he had 10 billion friends, whenever he introduced me he’d say ‘this is my brother’ and I just played along,” said Urban, a former Annapolis Police Department officer who shared Canty’s red hair. “I’d say, ‘Mom’s birthday is coming up. Did you get her a card?’ He’d say, ‘I got the card last year, it’s your turn,’ and then we’d get in a brotherly tiff.”

Over time, Urban’s running joke with the bartender on Dock Street developed into an enduring friendship — a pattern that followed Canty throughout his life as he grew into a community leader and admired businessman in the Annapolis and Baltimore dining scenes.

Canty’s death by suicide on Sept. 13 at 41 shocked many who came to know the bartender, who most recently worked at Shotti’s Point Charm City, as the life of the party.

“I saw that dude almost every single day for 20 years, and every moment was just unpredictable,” Urban said.

Canty was born in Annapolis on July 22, 1984, to parents William and Virginia Canty. He was raised in Pasadena with his sister, Michele. His father died at 59 in 2005, one month before Canty’s 21st birthday.

In his early 20s, Canty worked as a bartender at Docks Bar and Grill in Annapolis and spent his free time sailing, an activity his father had also loved.

Tyler Raven said he immediately became close with Canty after one day sailing on the Magothy River alongside a group of friends.

“Oh my goodness, he was just an absolute comic,” he said. “He knew how to tease you to the core but without making it hurtful. … You’d just kind of sit there and be like, ‘Oh, you got me. Nice work.”

But, behind the entertaining and playful conversations, Canty was focused. He executed jobs in a timely way and never complained, which can be tough when sailing at higher levels, Raven said. And he carried that demeanor into his work at bars and in the kitchen.

Raven recalled being shocked when a few friends’ late-night complaints of hunger before a sailing race prompted Canty to put together an “insane meal” of homemade pizzas, including one known as his “dessert pie.” At the time, Raven had no idea Canty was building a passion for making his own dough.

While working at Docks, Canty met another friend, Tom Hanna, who became co-founder of Canty’s Secret Spot Pizza Co. The Annapolis business started as a catering trailer parked near Hanna’s Metropolitan Kitchen in 2024, before developing into a brick-and-mortar spot in the Annapolis Market House in March of this year.

“It will forever be his place, his recipes,” said Hanna, who will keep the business going in Canty’s honor, describing himself as just a catalyst behind one of many Canty visions.

When Canty moved to Baltimore around 2011, he often discussed new business ideas with friends in the bar scene. Urban, who rented a room to him in the Federal Hill/Riverside neighborhood, said Canty’s early attempts at making clothing weren’t great but later evolved into Brown Bag Industries, a name under which he sold fun shirts and hats to many bartenders and friends in the industry.

Dan Zaranski, who worked with Canty at Wiley Gunter’s in Riverside, described him “like an octopus” for having his hands in different business concepts that stretched far and wide.

Zaranski said Canty worked at 823 E. Fort Ave. when it was the Sly Fox Pub and knew the owners from working at a famous bar under the same name in Annapolis. When the pub became Wiley Gunter’s, Canty helped Zaranski get his foot in the door, which Canty especially loved because it was a Washington Commanders bar. The pair worked together for six years until Canty started bartending at Don’t Know Tavern on Light Street and, most recently, Shotti’s Point Charm City, also on East Fort Avenue.

Shotti’s owner Kristie Bukowski said she thought Canty was funny and handsome when she met him nearly a decade ago in the bar, which is a watering hole for local bartenders.

During his four years working for Bukowski, he often showed up wearing shirts he made of former football team owner Dan Snyder dressed as a clown that he sold and gave away to friends. Canty also made shirts for Bukowski’s business and treated staff to pizza, the dough of which he had down to a science, she said.

She was excited about his new pizza-making venture in Annapolis and looking forward to meeting his friends there, because he often started sentences with “my buddy in Baltimore” or “my buddy in Annapolis.”

“He was so full of life,” she said.

Bukowski said Canty embodied the qualities it takes to succeed in the industry: charisma, a strong will and an ability to handle chaos. At times, she said, she reflects on her friendship with him by looking at a video of him filling his cheeks with water and taking turns slapping a flour tortilla against a co-worker‘s face to see who spit first.

It was easy to enjoy life with Canty, Urban said. He did everything his way, including playing golf barefoot when it was warm out, despite having seemingly hundreds of golf shoes.

“If it was bright and loud and exciting, he loved it,” Urban said.

Canty is survived by his mother, sister, brother-in-law, Kurt Gant, and nieces, Ashley and Kendall Gant.

If you or someone you know is experiencing a mental health crisis, call or text 988 to contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.

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