Johnny L. Teale

Birth date: Dec 15, 1954 Death date: May 7, 2023

John Teale was born December 15, 1954 in Alexandria, Louisiana and passed away peacefully in his home in Tucson, AZ on May 7, 2023. John spent the majority of his childhood and early adulthood in Albuquerque, NM, graduating from Read Obituary

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Marcia Jakab

26w ago

Chris,

I am so very sorry to find out about John's passing. Almost two years ago already. Please accept my sincere belated condolences.

I got a call just this evening (March 31, 2025) from the Town of Marana wanting to speak to a Board Member from Palisades at the Pines. I was shocked, as I moved away 8 years ago . . . and then they asked for Skip Osgood who passed away 5 years ago. That's what led me to Google for John - and then so sad to find out he's gone too. (Skip, John & I used to joke about the only way we could get off that HOA Board was to either move away or die . . . guess we all proved that to be true.)

I was fortunate to get to know John through that HOA Board. He was a super guy. It was John's big Christmas Star, on high, shining over the quarry golf course that meant it was officially the holiday season. I will always remember that birthday party you hosted for John in 2016 just before my Bill passed away. We had such a nice time celebrating with you all.

Chris, I hope you are doing well. Again, I am so sorry for your loss. You and John were great together. Know that I'm sending a virtual hug your way.

Marcia Jakab
(formerly N Douglas Fir Dr - now Charleston SC)

Leslie Meaney

29w ago

I'm late to this news. John & I had lost contact, and for that, I am extremely saddened. But I still hold a special place in my heart for him.

John gave me the most special gift that anyone has ever given me. Spending an enormous number of hours over a period of at least 6 months playing online, John patiently (well, sort of) taught me to play competitive bridge. In one particularly grueling (and frustrating for John) session, I distinctly remember him telling me that he was literally pounding his keyboard to get something through my, at the moment, thick head.

He also told me later that it was a labor of love.

Once I had finally mastered the skills, bridge enriched my life in so many ways, I cannot possibly put it into words. Thank you and good bye dear friend.

Cindy Harris

41w ago

John, I am thinking of you today on your 70th birthday. I managed to post a reel with music to Instagram with just a few pictures; that’s a tech win for me. I miss you and loved you so much. Cindy Teale Harris

Alan O Lebeck

79w ago

1006 Tramway Lane NE
Albuquerque, NM 87122

27 March 2024

To the family of John Teale:

I was very sorry to find out that John had passed away. You have my deepest sympathy.
John Teale was one of the best students I had when I was Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of New Mexico. John was in a least two classes in design I taught to undergraduates. Then he did a Master’s degree where he became a Research Assistant on an ONR project. I required all students to do a Master’s thesis. He did really good work and we coauthored three reports and two published papers noted below.
I was happy to see that John went on to a long career at IBM. We kept track during his early years there but then I left the University and connections faltered.
I am very sorry for your loss.

Sincerely,
Alan Lebeck

Former Professor
UNM Mechanical
Engineering

Lebeck, A.O., Teale, J.L., and Pierce, R.E., "Hydrodynamic Lubrication and Wear in Wavy Contacting Face Seals," Journal of Lubrication Technology, Vol. 100, January, 1978, pp. 81 91.
Teale, J.L. and Lebeck, A.O., "An Evaluation of the Average Flow Model (1) for Surface Roughness Effects in Lubrication," Journal of Lubrication Technology, Vol. 102, No. 3, July 1980, pp. 360 367.

Thesis:
Teale, J. L., "Surface Roughness Effects in Hydrodynamic Lubrication," MS Thesis, Mechanical Engineering Department, University of New Mexico, August, 1978.

Ray Pierce

93w ago

Our most sincere condolences to Johnny's family. I recently learned of his passing when a mutual friend sent me a Christmas card with the sad news.

I met Johnny in June 1976 when he and I started graduate school at UNM. We had the same thesis advisor (Dr. Alan Lebeck) who was also the Principal Investigator of the research project we were both on as Research Assistants. John and I shared an office and worked closely together during those years. Upon graduation, we both got employment offers from IBM Tucson and started working there at the same time. We continued our friendship during those early days at IBM Tucson, although John worked in Product Development in tape drives and I worked in Product Test in floppy disk products. After I left IBM in 1981 we still exchanged Christmas cards, but over the years we unfortunately lost touch.

Upon reflection I have many fond memories of Johnny. As so many have already noted, he was super-smart while still being very personable and having a great sense of humor. If we had the same class, I always knew who would be the top student. After my having attended a military academy (college) and just completing a five year tour in the Army, meeting Johnny with his long hair and beard was a refreshing start to my civilian life. And despite the fact that I had been married for four years and starting a family when John was still single we still got along famously.

Thank you Johnny for being my friend and introducing me to green chili burgers, Fleetwood Mac, and that dive of a bar on the east side of the Sandias we rode our motorcycles to, where we listened to music, and played pool.

Ray and Diane Pierce

A donation to the Professor Charles "Gib" Richards Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship fund at the UNM Department of Mechanical Engineering was made in the memory of Johnny L. Teale.

Mike Liddicoat And Heather Otto

123w ago

Chris, We are so sorry to hear about John. I hope you received my email from about two weeks ago, sharing a few thoughts about working with John. Our working relationship from my time in Tape was one of the most positive part of that time. John’s technical knowledge and contributions and most importantly John’s sense of humor were characteristics I’ll always cherish.
God bless you and your family.
Mike and Heather

Daniel Winarski

123w ago

A donation to the Computer History Museum has been made in memory of John Teale. Accompanying the donation was this statement: “John had the unique ability to bring people with diverse skills together and focus them on the common goal of advancing tape archival storage. John’s insight and technical background led the Linear Tape Open “Ultrium” team at IBM to unimagined levels of lasting accomplishment.”

John, this could not have happened without you,
Daniel Winarski

Chris Teale

123w ago

Added 23 new photos to the Family, Friends, and Fun album.

Erik Solhjell

124w ago

I am deeply sorry to hear of John’s passing. I had the pleasure of meeting John many times over more than 20-25 years when I was heading the tape drive development at Tandberg Data and later when I had started Tandberg Storage where we developed a series of half height LTO drives. I also had the special pleasure of meeting John here in Norway, and I still remember the nice dinner we had one evening at Lillehammer with a very interesting technical discussion afterwards lasting until the early morning.
John was technically brilliant, but he was also a very warm and kind person. My deepest condolences to his family.

Erik Solhjell

Oslo, Norway

Enrique Aviles

125w ago

Very sad to hear of John’s passing. Our deepest condolences to his family. John was a brilliant technologist, with many significant contributions to tape data storage. His leadership and talent for negotiation led to the amazing success of LTO, which continues as the dominant tape technology in use today.

Enrique and Jennifer Aviles

Ray Pierce

93w ago

Our most sincere condolences to Johnny's family. I recently learned of his passing when a mutual friend sent me a Christmas card with the sad news.

Ray and Diane Pierce

A donation to the Professor Charles "Gib" Richards Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship fund at the UNM Department of Mechanical Engineering was made in the memory of Johnny L. Teale.

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