Carl C. Teipel, Jr. (1922-2018)

7/11/2018
BLADE STAFF
Carl Clement Teipel, Jr.
Carl Clement Teipel, Jr.

Carl C. Teipel, Jr., who succeeded his father as head of a real estate and insurance business founded nearly a century ago and became a vice president of an up-and-coming realty business, the Danberry Co., died Sunday in his Sylvania home. He was 95.

He was in ill health recently, his wife, Donna Teipel, said.

“He was a loyal husband and father,” his son Christopher Teipel said.

Mr. Teipel retired in 1989 from Danberry, where he was a vice president and managing broker for residential real estate at the firm’s Maumee office. He maintained his real estate license for several years and did work for Owens Corning, his son said. 

“He was proud, quiet,” his son said. When working with clients, Mr. Teipel paid attention to what clients said in order to discern what their ideal property would be. 

“He would listen to their stories, what they needed,” said his son, a mental health counselor, who said he learned the importance of listening from his father. “He really believed that was what gave him meaning and purpose in his work, when he felt it was a match for both sides.”

Mr. Teipel, with Danberry, sold some of the largest residential properties in the area, including old estates along the Maumee River, said Brian McMahon, his stepson-in-law and president of Danberry National Ltd., a separate commercial real estate business.

“He was a genuine good person,” said Mr. McMahon, formerly managing broker for the Danberry Co. commercial division. “He had what I would call genetic people skills. Over the years, Carl knew quite a vast variety of people. He had many friends who remained his friends his entire life.”

Richard Glowacki, who started Danberry in 1962, named Mr. Teipel a vice president in 1965. 

Mr. Teipel, a lieutenant in the Navy, returned from World War II service in the Pacific Theater to work in the downtown offices of the Carl Teipel Co., a real estate and insurance business his father started in 1919. The younger Mr. Teipel became president in 1954. The firm merged with an insurance business in 1957 to form the Teipel-Brown Co. That firm in 1959 merged with the Welles-Bowen Co., which also dealt in real estate and insurance. Mr. Teipel became a Welles-Bowen vice president. 

Mr. Teipel was president in 1962 of the Toledo Board of Realtors, which his father led in 1934.

He was born Nov. 27, 1922, to Grace Potter Teipel and Carl Teipel, Sr. He attended Perrysburg schools and Maumee Valley Country Day School. He was a 1940 graduate of the Hill School in Pottstown, Pa. He received a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University.

He was a longtime member of Maumee Rotary Club and had been a Paul Harris Fellow.

“It was a place where he found a purpose bigger than himself. It was important for him to be of service to people,” his son said.

He was formerly married to the late Virginia Hall Teipel. His wife, Miriam Lambert Teipel, died in 1978. His wife, Val Munger Teipel, died in 1986.

Surviving are his wife, Donna Gross Teipel, whom he married Feb. 28, 1987; daughters Dorothea Teipel and Christina Teipel; sons Christopher and Joseph Teipel; stepdaughters Lucy Lambert, Katherine Pettit, Marcy McMahon, and Jacqueline Cartner; stepsons Bruce Munger, Scott Munger, Jeffrey Gross, and James Gross; 17 grandchildren, and 29 great-grandchildren.

Memorial services will be at 1 p.m. Thursday at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Maumee, with visitation after 11 a.m. Arrangements are by the Foth-Dorfmeyer Mortuary.

The family suggests tributes to the Maumee Rotary Foundation or a charity of the donor’s choice.

Contact Mark Zaborney at mzaborney@theblade.com or 419-724-6182.