John Peel

PEEL, John "Larry" Larry Peel quietly passed away in his home at the age of 86 on December 17, 2019 with his beloved wife, Deborah, at his side. They married 39 years ago. He was interred at a small cemetery near his ranch in the Hill Country. Larry was a force of nature. Bigger than life, his interests were wide and diverse, ranging from building environmentally unique and award-winning apartment complexes to public television and opera. After his first successes with apartments, Larry even tried his hand at "ranching", Peel style. He bought a ranch in the hill country which blended his style of entertaining with his passion for enhancing the environment. It was his favorite place to go and not surprisingly, he personally built or supervised turning it into a veritable park with lakes and water features. He was no stranger to chainsaws and tractors and farm equipment in building this vision. Not known for subtlety, you always knew where you stood with Larry Peel. He was loud, often opinionated, had an irrepressible sense of humor and a deep and abiding generosity. It was little known and rarely shared that Larry recovered from polio as a child which may largely explain his indomitable spirit and the gusto he brought to everything he did. He was made to overcome obstacles even polio could not squash that indomitable spirit. Born in Iowa and raised in Arizona, Larry found his way to Texas through the Permian Basin and ultimately landed in Austin in 1963 working in the insurance industry before he discovered his real professional passion in 1971building and developing environmentally engaging apartment complexes. Larry did not just build apartment complexes though. When he founded the Larry Peel Company, he was particularly interested in finding unique and frequently environmentally lush locations incorporating the natural beauty into the community. He was a perfectionist when it came to design and execution and expected the same respect for the beauty of his site from those with whom he worked. God help a subcontractor that cut down a tree on a Peel development. Unheard of in those days, the Austin City Council in 1984 gave its first Multifamily Environmental Awareness Award for a project to Larry Peel and followed two years later by naming him as the first developer to receive the award. Over the next twenty years, he received a dozen different awards celebrating projects and lifetime achievement. One of the more notable was the Pillars of the Industry for the Best Garden Apartment Development in the United States awarded by the National Council of Multifamily Housing Industry. Larry cherished the central Texas environment and sought and developed properties that reflected his love of the Hill Country. But being a highly successful and unique developer barely told the story of Larry Peel. He believed deeply in the things that build and nurture community. He served as a member of the Board of Trustees of KLRU, ultimately chairing the Board from 1989 to 1990. He and a few other Board members are even credited with building a business plan that helped keep Austin City Limits alive when it faced a serious crisis in 2000. Similarly, he was a long-time supporter of Austin Lyric Opera serving on their Board of Trustees from 1995-1999. To some, the first introduction to the name Larry Peel was on TV. For years the Larry Peel Company was the primary underwriter for PBS' long time NOVA series. In addition, he was instrumental in supporting St. David's Community Foundation, the Hill Country Conservancy, Austin Smiles, Safe Place, and HeartGift. But that barely scratches the surface of Larry's contributions to a rapidly evolving Austin. Along with a hand full of likeminded friends, Larry essentially pioneered a culture of appreciation and collection of fine wine, building one of the deepest cellars in Austin. But like everything else in Larry's life, wine was not just about collecting, it was about sharing and broadening his community. More than thirty years ago, he founded the Texas Hill Country Wine and Food Festival and by the force of his personality, began the Rare and Fine Wine Auction and ultimately the Wine and Food Foundation. Due to Larry's efforts, Austin's growing community of collectors reached deep into their cellars making available to the public wine and wine-related experiences that would otherwise not be available in Austin of the 1990s and 2000s. He also combined two passions, making KLRU a major beneficiary of funds raised at the Wine and Food Foundation auction. But that was only one example. Besides his own deep appreciation and pure pleasure in sharing, Larry would donate wine dinners for 10 in his cellar featuring Austin's celebrity chefs and his own incomparable wine to various auctions and charities that he supported. In doing so, he relished welcoming an evening with people who arrived as strangers and left as friends. Larry and his wife Deborah might host as many as two charity dinners a month, all to benefit various good causes. And it should not go unmentioned that Larry supported Austin's growing and robust sommelier community by donating wine selflessly to fellow aficionado Brian Owens' Salons. The Salons were designed to give young 'somms' access to experiencing and learning about different vintages and types of wine that would not ordinarily be available. But no tale of Larry Peel would be complete without his true love and partner in adventure for almost four decades, his wife Deborah. They travelled the world together. They raised two daughters together. Both strong willed and accomplished professionals in their own right, Larry and Deborah were that rare combination of toughness and kindness and neither flinched in the face of confronting overwhelming odds in their respective fields. Larry is survived by his wife of 39 years, Deborah C. Peel MD, daughter, Emma Peel and her husband Paul Burch; daughter, Kathryn Peel Gordon and her husband Ross Gordon, and their children Louisa Peel Gordon and Rurik Peel Gordon. Larry is also survived by his daughter, Tracy Peel and her son Dillon Havins; daughter, Jamye Peel and her son, Ryan Pawlak and wife Seon, and daughter, Jessica Pawlak; daughter, Janna Paulson and her husband Steve, and their son Nicholas; son, John Peel and his wife Debbie, and their son Daniel; son, Mike Billotte; grandson, Daniel Billotte and his wife Cynthia and their children Maisie & Zoe; granddaughter Leigh Caliendo and her husband Brian and children Aiden and Beau. If you wish to make a donation in his honor, please contribute to KLRU https://austinpbs.org/ or the Hill Country Conservancy https://hillcountryconservancy.org/donatenow/ .