Obituary for
Leo Joseph Tevlin
Leo J. Tevlin, Fortified with the Sacraments of the Holy Mother Church on Tuesday, September 12, 2017 at age 94. Beloved father, grandfather, great grandfather, son of Leo J. Tevlin and Anna C. Kreutzer Tevlin, preceded in death by his beloved wife Mary Anna (nee Fouch), sisters Anna Marie Tevlin Guerra and Teresa Tevlin Price and brothers John “Jack” Tevlin, Dan Tevlin, and son Dominic Tevlin; survived by children Anna Lee Tevlin Halsig (Daniel “Pete”), Linda Tevlin Pleasant (Carl), Mary Tevlin (Mark, recently deceased), Leo Tevlin, II (Donna), Peter Tevlin (Kim), Louis Tevlin, Amy Tevlin Myers (Ken); Grandchildren: Paul Pleasant (Katy) , Gwenn Secrease (Joseph Boyd), Denise Pleasant Reed (Ryan), Eric Secrease (Sarah), Andrew Tevlin (Melissa), Laura Tevlin, Kyle Tevlin, Daniel Halsig, Amanda Myers, Shannon Tevlin O’Bryant (Doug), Kristin Tevlin, Matthew Myers, and Rachael Myers; Great grandchildren: Wyatt Secrease, Lincoln Secrease, and Scarlett Secrease, Andrew Pleasant, and Luke Pleasant, Jacob Reed, and Kaitlyn Reed, Joseph Boyd, Orion Boyd, Fiona Tevlin, Noelle Moore.
Leo a Native St. Louisan who, at age 5, witnessed Charles Lindbergh fly over downtown for an awaiting parade crowd. Leo Tevlin would later become an Aviator himself serving in World War II and Korea as a Naval fighter pilot flying 77 missions.
Tevlin was inducted into the St. Louis Media Hall of Fame in 2016 for his pioneering work as a Chief Engineer in helping to launch three television stations here. A cameraman for CBS’ 1st network televised MLB Game of the Week series with Dizzy Dean & Pee-Wee Reese. Tevlin worked on network coverage of the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo space programs and later became part of the nation’s 1st E-N-G news gathering operation transitioning from Film clips in Newscasts to video tape & Live shot technology and paving the way for today’s news gathering method used worldwide.
As one of the oldest living Amateur Radio Operators - licensed in 1934- (Ham Radio) Leo Tevlin help the Catholic Church with its missionary work & expansion into South America. Fittingly, his call letters were W-ZERO-TV.
After helping KSD-TV ch.5 become St. Louis first TV station, Tevlin launched KACY-TV, a short lived Dumont Network station and then KWK-TV ch.4 which became CBS Owned KMOX-TV ch.4 where he retired in 1985 having worked for CBS Television for better than 40 years.
Visitation 4:00pm-8:00pm Monday, September 18, at Bopp Chapel, 10610 Manchester Rd., in Kirkwood, MO. There will also be a visitation from 9:00am until time of Funeral Mass at 10:00am on Tuesday, September 19, at Basilica of Saint Louis, King Parish (The Old Cathedral), 209 Walnut St, St. Louis, MO 63102. Interment following Mass at Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery. Memorial contributions may be made to Society of the Propagation of Faith or Mount Grace Convent (Pink Sisters) 1438 E. Warne Ave., St. Louis, Mo.63107.