Terence Harold Van Vliet

Sunrise Sept. 19, 1935

Sunset March 19, 2025

Good night sweet prince, and angels sing thee to thy rest.

Terry often taught Hamlet during his 33 years at Immaculate Heart High School.

Terence Harold Van Vliet was born in Glendale, California to Harold and Winifred (Elgin) Vliet. (T. added the “Van” back to his name.). He was the oldest of four children and was predeceased by his sister Lynda. He is survived by his spouse of 60 years, Jan Keller; sisters Sharon (Don Martin) and Janice (David Brown) and their children and Jan’s sisters and brother and their spouses and children who loved him as their own. He died in hospice care of dementia.

At the age of eight he contracted polio and spent a year in Los Angeles General Hospital. He fondly remembered his grandfather who visited him often and usually brought a small present. This sojourn put him behind in school and his math skills never recovered.

The family moved from the San Fernando Valley to Mojave where T. attended Lancaster High School. His cousin Don, who later became Captain Beefheart, also went to school there and they knew Frank Zappa.

Terry’s love of literature and especially poetry began to blossom there with the encouragement of his English teacher. It was in Mojave that he was baptized and confirmed as a Roman Catholic.

After his father had a serious heart attack, the family moved to Las Vegas where Terry became involved in a small theatre group and began his love of acting. He decided that he had a religious calling and entered the Trappist Monastery in Vina, California. He stayed a year and then moved to San Francisco and worked in Elder’s bookstore. His next move was to Santa Barbara where he attended UC Santa Barbara. He met Rudolph Gilbert who was the curator of the Santa Barbara Museum of Art and a devoted Catholic and they became close friends. T. always referred to Rudolph as his godfather and learned a great deal about art and music from him. T. moved to Los Angeles and lost contact with Rudolph until the late 60’s when he and Jan began making frequent visits to see him.

In Los Angeles he worked in a variety of places including Leon Uris’s bookshop in the San Fernando Valley. At some point he returned to his interest in acting and through friends got an agent. At the time there was a lot of parts for actors who had English accents, so T. developed a slight accent, just enough to get several parts. Many people thought he was British but he had a knack to mimic almost any accent. When asked if he was British, he often replied, “No, just affected!”

In 1964 he moved into a tacky apartment building in West Hollywood, close to his agent, and next to what turned out to be Jan’s unit. He invited the manager of the building to dinner and she asked if he could also give Jan a ride as he was going to the same restaurant where his roommate worked. That ride resulted in 60 years of living and loving together.

In the mid 60’s the demand for actors with British accents began to diminish and T. faced long periods of unemployment. Jan had decided at T’s suggestion and encouragement to move from being a surgical

technician to enroll in library school at Immaculate Heart College. As Jan graduated and got a job, T. decided to go back to school, too. He majored in English at IHC and completed his degree summa cum

laude in 1969. He taught initially in a school in the Valley and then applied to IHHS and began in 1970 and retired in 2003.

Terry loved teaching and loved his students. Beside teaching American and British literature, he developed a course that explored existentialism in literature, which had a great impact on many of his students. During his career he was often identified in many places by current and former students in the market, in restaurants, in Tower Records, at the LA Opera. They all had a great fondness for him.

In retirement Terry and Jan continued their love of traveling especially to England and France. They had always loved classical music and had season tickets to LA Opera and the LA Phil. T. was also very interested and knowledgeable about interior design, fashion, art, literature (especially poetry) and religion. In 2011 he published a collection of his poems, Black Lines on Terracota.

A Funeral Mass will be celebrated on Saturday, April 26, 2025,11:00 AM at Our Mother of Good Counsel, 2060 Vermont Avenue Los Angeles, CA 90027.

Terry and Jan were Oblates of St. Andrew’s Abbey in Valyermo, California where T. will be interred.

In lieu of flowers, please make a donation in Terry's name to your favorite charity, to Immaculate Heart High School or St. Andrew’s Abbey.

In lieu of flowers, please make a donation in his name to your favorite

charity or to Immaculate Heart High School or St. Andrew’s Abbey.