Remembering Marvin Teel, 90 The Oldest Paper Boy

As arguably the nation's oldest "paper boy" Marvin Teel, 90, of Christopher was in good company. Walter Cronkite, Bob Hope, Ed Sullivan, Danny Thomas, John Wayne, Bing Crosby, Dwight Eisenhauer and Dr. Martin Luther King all got their first paychecks as newspaper carriers.

There's a 93-year-old man in California who claims to be the oldest, but delivers papers for a weekly. "That doesn't count," Teel once told me.

This isn't a story about just a paper boy. It's a story about a truly brilliant man who studied physics, chemistry and math, briefly worked after college as a Christopher High School teacher and Sangamo Co. chemist. He later did television repair and antenna work for decades, scaling 100-foot antennas well into his 80s. He also was a rural U.S. mail carrier for 45 years.

But, moreover, its about the work ethic and the caring he instilled in his family before he died. That life was laid out in the photographic displays and memorabilia so thoughtfully put together by two of his granddaughters, Linaya Germann of Carbondale and Courtney Overturf of Royalton, daughters of Mr. and Mrs. Sherry Bullock of Du Quoin. Sherry is one of Marvin's four children. The others are Forrest (Ann) Teel of Christopher, Winona Teel of Johnston City and Taylor (Kim) Teel of Christopher.

There was a display of his career in the Navy during World War II including his commemorative "WWII" license plate. In fact, the American Flag that covered one end of the open casket was testament to his love of country.

There was a display having to do with his work as a newspaper carrier for the Benton Evening News and at the end of his casket was the antique Schwinn bicycle with baskets front and back that he used to make his daily rounds in Christopher. He had friends all over town and you could set your watch by when he peddled past your porch. As a veteran motor route U.S. mail carrier, he could have driven the route. But his three-mile bicycle route kept him healthy and agile and he said, "I don't spend money on gas."

"He was feeling sick and we wanted to take him to the emergency room, but he wouldn't go until he got the newspapers delivered. So even the day he went into the hospital, he delivered," Sherry Bullock of Du Quoin said of her brother, who would have turned 91 next month. "He had a real work ethic. He believed if you said you were going to do something, you did it," he is quoted.

"He felt the more active you were, the more alert you stayed," Bullock said.

He was opinionated and quietly argumentative, but he was that way to get people to think. He challenged your purpose--why you put on this earth.

And, he was loved--by his family and by his newspaper customers. We should all be so lucky. Dozens of photos at the funeral home were the clear evidence of that love.

Teel is survived by his wife of 70 years, Marilyn, four children, seven grandchildren, eight great-grandchildren and a sister.

His funeral was Wednesday at the Greenwood United Methodist Church near Mulkeytown. Interment was in the Ward Cemetery.