Gerald "Jerry" Bellis

Services will be held for Gerald “Jerry” Bellis on October 11, 2023, at 10:30 a.m. in the Stewart Family Funeral Home Chapel with Rev. Pike Wisner officiating. A private family burial will follow at Cathedral in the Pines Cemetery in Tyler under the direction of the Stewart Family Funeral Home. Mr. Bellis died on October 3, 2023, in the Meadow Lake Nursing Facility. He was born February 19, 1929, in Marshalltown, Iowa and was the son of Gerald Basil Bellis and Jessie Opal Drake Bellis. His parents moved back to St. Joseph, Missouri when he was three years old. He grew up there and graduated from Lafayette High School in 1946. After graduating he and nine fellow graduates joined the U.S. Army. He spent thirteen months in Korea in 1946-47 during the occupation at the end of World War II. He married the love of his life, Mary Louise King, in St. Joseph, Missouri on September 3, 1949. He graduated from the University of Missouri School of Mines and Metallurgy in 1951 with a B. S. in Civil Engineering. He was a member of Tau Beta Pi, Chi Epsilon, and Phi Kappa Phi honorary societies. Upon graduation, he was commissioned a 2nd Lt. in the Army Reserve. He was employed by the California Company, a subsidiary of Standard Oil of California, later to become Chevron. His initial employment was in New Orleans, Louisiana where he was involved in some of the earliest designs of offshore fixed and mobile oil platforms. He later worked in Jackson, Mississippi and London, England and then returned to New Orleans. He was the Chief Design and Construction Engineer for Chevron's Eastern Region when he retired in December 1988. Following retirement, he and Mary moved to Tyler and built a home on Lake Palestine where he and Mary resided for nineteen years. They moved back to Tyler in April 2008. After Mary’s death in 2019, he moved to Meadow Lake retirement home in January 2020. He accepted Christ at First Baptist Church in St. Joseph, Missouri in April 1939. He was ordained a deacon at Oak Park Baptist Church in January 1959 in New Orleans, LA. He also served as a deacon and Sunday School Teacher at Broadmoor Baptist Church in Jackson, MS. He and Mary joined First Baptist Church in Tyler in 1989, where he served as a deacon and adult Sunday School Teacher and volunteered at the Tyler Family Assistance Center. He was a member and past President of Tyler Alpha Kiwanis and a SCORE volunteer for sixteen years. Mr. Bellis was preceded in death by his beloved wife of 69 years, Mary Louise ·Bellis, his son, John King Bellis, and his parents. He is survived by daughters, Vickie L. Gerrard (Robert) of Brandon, MS and Kathryn Bellis of Houston, TX.; son, Steven Bellis (Mikie); grandchildren: Robin Clay (Derek) of Flowood, MS, Holly Holder (Casey) of Brandon, MS, Mitchell Bellis (Katie) of Red Bank, NJ, Evan Bellis of Houston, TX, Rachel Root of Georgetown, TX, Hilarie Bellis Sexton (Jimmy) of San Francisco, CA, Avery Bellis of Santa Monica, CA; and great-granddaughters: Adalidah Crocker and Amelia Clay of Flowood, MS, Lyla Bellis of Red Bank, NJ, and Colette Sexton of San Francisco, CA. Jerry was a husband, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, who loved his family beyond measure. He greatly missed his beautiful and lovely wife Mary after her death. Pallbearers are Mitchell Bellis, Evan Bellis, Robert Gerrard, Rachel Root, Casey Holder, and Derek Clay. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to Tyler First Baptist Church, 301 W. Ferguson, Tyler, TX 75702 (www.fbctyler.org) or a charity of your choice. The family will receive friends an hour before the service.

Gerald "Jerry" Bellis

February 19, 1929 - October 3, 2023