Leonardo "Leo" Enrique Fernandez

Leonardo “Leo” Enrique Fernandez passed away on Friday, March 11th at home, surrounded by family. He is survived by the love of his life, his wife of 60 years, Carmen Loera Fernandez and their six children, Michael (Tina), Teresa Fernandez Spector (Mark), Leo, Mark, Monica and Andrew (Lauren) and Grandchildren Felicia, Teeya, Nikolai, Anthony, Kameron, Christian, Adam and Carolyn Spector and Bruin and Roman Fernandez.

Leonardo was born in El Paso, Texas on December 10th, 1932 to Enrique and Carolina Fernandez. He was the youngest of three children. He lived his first nine years in El Paso, Texas and then moved to Los Angeles, California. Leo attended Nativity Elementary School and Mt. Carmel High School in Los Angeles. He joined the United States Air Force in 1951. He was stationed at Ft. Belvoir in Virginia and Travis AFB in CA. After his discharge from the Air Force, he joined the Christian Brothers in Napa, CA for discernment. Later, he returned to El Paso where he graduated from Texas Western (UTEP) with a degree in English Literature.

In 1958 he met Carmen Loera and in 1961 they were married at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in El Paso, Texas. They moved to California in 1961, where Leo worked for the Department of Employment for the State of California. He was identified to be very good at helping others learn their jobs and in dealing with difficult staff issues, he was sent to Colton as Office Manager, later to San Fernando and then to East Los Angeles, each time to remedy staff problems. After 10 years with the Department of Employment he left to join the Social Security Administration. After about six months at the Torrance office, he was asked to be Office Manager in Honolulu, Hawaii, where the family enjoyed living for one year. He was then asked to move to the San Francisco main office to be part of the team to develop SSI (Supplemental Security Income). There he met with the Governors of Hawaii, California, Nevada and Arizona for the implementation of SSI. He then returned to Southern California as District Manager in Huntington Park where he defused a very tense situation with a gunman who had entered the office, peacefully talking the gunman into surrendering his weapon to him. He was at the Huntington Park office for 28 years. He retired in 2002.

Leo was a man of faith and service. He gave blood to the Red Cross so often that he was presented with a gold blood drop pin. During his time at the Huntington Park office, he was also a member, and served as president, of the Kiwanis Club Hunting Park, an organization whose mission is to helps kids around the world. He practiced this mission in Huntington Park by working and volunteering with the local YMCA and internationally by organizing trips to Tijuana, Mexico to help support the orphanages there. He was generous with his time, creative with his ideas, and passionate about making a difference. And he always made a point of having fun along the way.

After retirement, Leo and Carmen enjoyed five years of traveling the world. He had a wonderful sense of adventure. He was all too happy to travel with Carmen on a trip to Europe with the St. Irenaeus adult choir and happily describe himself as a choir “groupie”.

The family have been members of St. Irenaeus parish since 1969. During their married life, Leo and Carmen attended Cursillo and Marriage Encounter.

Leo was a lector for many years and was in parish counsel for one year when Father Rod Keller was Pastor. After both Leo and Carmen retired, they participated in prayer groups, one of which was headed by Sister Rita. Sister Rita encouraged Leo to become a Eucharistic minister for the home bound, which he did for many years. Leo and Carmen were in this prayer group for about twenty-five years. Leo also joined the Knights of Columbus. The Knights were used to assist at mass and at funerals.

Leo loved to wear Aloha shirts, a habit he learned while living in Hawaii. He only donned a shirt, jacket and tie when absolutely required.

Leo had a great and deep love of family. He was an attentive, caring and loving son, brother, uncle, husband, father and grandfather. The love he had for his cousins was so deep that we, his children thought of them more like his brothers and sisters.

Together with Carmen, Leo instilled a love of music, theater, art, literature and of course, comedy. The home they shared was often described as, “the laughing house”. When it came to music, Leo and Carmen would take the family to the Dorothy Chandler for Youth Symphony programs as well as musicals. His children gained a love of Chopin, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Puccini, Rimsky-Korsakov and Offenbach.

Leo loved sports and played basketball and football in high school. He loved his UCLA Bruins and would love going to games with the family. In fact, going to games was a major event complete with tailgate picnics.

Leo made it a priority to give his children the best experiences and lessons he could offer. He loved nature and would take the family on vacation to National Parks, State parks and on hiking and fishing trips to Big Bear and Mammoth Lakes . Leo’s love for fishing is passed on to his children, with whom he made it a point to arrange yearly fishing trips for his sons and grandsons to all be together for a male bonding trip like he had with his cousins. “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” A lesson he enshrined in us all. We traveled to Mexico with family to our Great Uncle’s ranch and spent many hours telling stories about our adventures.

Leo was a kind, wise and welcoming man, some family members and close friends have described him thus:

“Recent days have brought back many memories of your father. I'm not sure I've met anyone who quite had his gift to project joy to envelope a room. You couldn't help but be happy. He had that unique grin and light in his eyes - like he was letting you in on a secret that a playful prank was about to be sprung, filling you with excited anticipation.”

“Hardly a day goes by that I don’t remember some little tip or bit of advice that your Dad gave me when I was growing up. Small things, but all valuable and they added up in a meaningful way. Wonderful memories and I was blessed to have him in my life.”

“Music will be even more poignant for you now”

Leo was given last rites by Father Binh on Friday, March 11th, all of Leo and Carmen’s children and several grandchildren were present. Leo passed at 5:45pm on March 11th.

Support for the church and surrounding community is an important part of Leo’s legacy. To help others in need and in his honor, you can partner with H.O.P.E. at St. Irenaeus, (Helping Other People Everyday). Checks written to: H.O.P.E. and mailed to: St. Irenaeus Catholic Church, 5201 Evergreen Ave., Cypress, CA 90630

Fond memories and expressions of sympathy may be shared at www.funerariadelangelanaheim.com for the Fernandez family.