Article published September 21, 2006
TUCK B. LEE, 1929-2006
Electrical engineer started his own firm in Northwood
Tuck B. Lee, 77, founder and president of TL Industries Inc., an electronics firm headquartered in Northwood that provides design services to business and industry, died Tuesday in his Orlando, Fla., home from complications of liver and colon cancer.
He and his wife, Ham-Hi, moved to Orlando from Perrysburg Township about 10 years ago.
Mr. Lee in 1995 received the Key to the Golden Door Award from the International Institute in Toledo. The award is given to a naturalized citizen who makes significant contributions to the community while maintaining his ethnic culture.
He found success, not for its own sake, but through building a company to provide for his family, his son, Albert, said.
"My father was the sort of man who wasn't a bombastic personality," his son said. "He was quiet and did what he felt was the right thing for his business and his family. He was very touched by [the award] and, at the same time, he was humbled by it. He wasn't looking for the accolades."
Mr. Lee founded TL Industries about 1970. He'd come to the United States from South Korea in 1958 to pursue graduate studies in electrical engineering at the University of Michigan. He later was a NASA research engineer.He joined a friend's Toledo electronics business in the late 1960s. He began to think, "If he can do this, I can do this," he told The Blade in 1988.
His son said: "It was the quintessential American dream."
TL Industries' first customer was Libbey-Owens-Ford Co. TL later won contracts with Owens-Illinois Inc. and Owens Corning, among other firms.
"Tuck was a man of few words," said Ted Stechschulte, vice president of the firm. "He typically would lead by example. He was a risk-taker in the best sense of the word. He loved business and to be involved in different types of business.
"The biggest thing Tuck did was go out and find people with talents that complemented his and allowed them to make mistakes and learn on the job," Mr. Stechschulte said.
Mr. Lee also had a hand in several start-up ventures, mostly technology-based, through the years, his son said.
Mr. Lee golfed and traveled. He liked to play cards, whether euchre or Texas Hold 'Em. His bookshelf was filled with books on playing bridge better, on improving vocabulary, on buying businesses.
"One of his unspoken themes was always trying to obtain more knowledge," his son said.
Mr. Lee was active in his church, Orlando Korean Presbyterian Church. He was a former member of the First United Methodist Church, Perrysburg.
Surviving are his wife, Ham-Hi, who married him April 24, 1961; son, Albert Lee; daughter, Jeanne Lee; two sisters, and a granddaughter.
Services will be at 7 tonight at Woodlawn Cemetery, Gotha, Fla., where the body will be after 6 tonight.
The family suggests tributes to the Tuck and Ham-Hi Lee Scholarship Fund at the University of Michigan college of engineering, Ann Arbor.
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