Remembering KLTV, KTRE News Director Kenny Boles

Published: Feb. 16, 2018 at 12:06 AM CST|Updated: Feb. 16, 2018 at 10:28 PM CST
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EAST TEXAS (KLTV) - This is an especially tough week for us at KLTV and KTRE News. Our leader for the last 22 years passed away on Wednesday night, February 14.

Kenny Boles had guided our news department as news director since 1996. Although he rarely appeared on television during that time, many of you know him. He was a native East Texan whose career took him full-circle, from Lufkin to Houston, Dallas, Chicago, and then back to East Texas.

Kenny had a profound impact on hundreds, likely thousands of journalists over his 47 years in broadcast news, and we wanted to share that part of his story with you.

"When the local cable company installed a television studio into Lufkin High School, I fell in love," Kenny said in a 2016 interview. "My dad was in the grocery business, and I hated the grocery business. I began looking for a way out."

That way out was KTRE in Lufkin. At 17 years old, Kenny started at Channel 9 the same way he mentored so many others to get their start: running camera in the studio, directing a newscast, sweeping the studio floors; he had found his way out of the grocery business.

And by age 19, he had found his way into one of the largest markets in the country.

"The state's Democratic Convention was gaveled to a close tonight here in Houston," he reported as a young reporter. The video of Kenny's days as a reporter and anchor in Houston resurfaced in 2016 when Kenny was inducted into the very exclusive Lone Star Emmys Silver Circle for Lifetime Achievement.

"Those tapes of my early anchor work...it was like I was looking at someone I knew, like an old friend. I knew him from the past, but I had moved on and left him behind," he reflected then.

Kenny left Houston behind for news management at TV stations in Dallas, Chicago, Orlando, and eventually Los Angeles. There, he broke stories on some of the biggest sagas in modern news history: Michael Jackson and the children at Neverland Ranch, The OJ Simpson arrest and trial, and the Rodney King beating and riots. Just one of those stories makes a career in TV news. One after another, after another, served to change Kenny's priorities.

"So he came back home, to East Texas, and for 22 years this man, who had left a career in the second largest market in the country, hired and taught young journalists to be great," says longtime friend and coworker Joe Terrell.

"Every time you reach out to give a piece of advice or assist or to help younger journalists, you are playing a hand in the next generation. They're going to carry the touch on. And to have the opportunity to influence them in a positive way and in a good way is just one of the most incredible rewards of doing what I do," Kenny said in that 2016 interview.

Our thoughts and prayers are with Kenny's wife Cynthia, his two sons, his granddaughter, his mother, sisters and other family in Lufkin.

His touching obituary:

In Memory of

David Kenneth Boles

July 26, 1954 - February 14, 2018

Obituary

Kenny Boles died on Wednesday, February 14, 2018. He was 63. 

His parents were David Kenneth Boles, Sr. and Ann Anderson Boles. Their family included an older sister, Sharon, and two younger sisters, Teresa Boles Stokes and Debi Boles Gault. They grew up in Lufkin, TX, where the extended Boles family owned several businesses, including the Boles Grocery Stores that served many smaller towns in East Texas. 

Kenny loved his 
family but did not like the grocery business. He loved television, especially television news. He began his career at KTRE in Lufkin at 17. By 18 he was the Sports Director. At 19 he went to KPRC in Houston and began an amazing career that would span more than forty years. 

Before he was through, he had been an overnight crime photographer and reporter, news producer, investigative journalist, anchorman, network field producer, and executive news producer in major markets developing national stories. 

Then he took a breath and moved back to East Texas, to Tyler, where he was News Director at KLTV. He molded the station into a regular Emmy winner. He hired young people just beginning their careers and taught them how to do the craft, and do it right. He nurtured his senior staff members, helping them to advance their careers based on what he taught them. 

His latest project wasn't so big…just re-designing the way news content is gathered, produced and presented to the growing digital audiences. Kenny designed "the newsroom of the future". Raycom Media's KLTV is the ONLY station in the country taking this bold step into an unknown news landscape. His eyes were always looking for the next big thing. 

And, in all of that, he always put family first. He adored his mother, Ann, treasured his sisters and their husbands, all of the grandchildren and 
great-grandchildren of the family. 

He loved his wife, Cynthia, earning the name St. Kenny for saving her life at least twice during the brain "unpleasantness". During her hospitalization, he stayed by her side in the Dallas hospital room, running KLTV from his laptop and phone.

Cynthia, by the way, loved him right back. They married on May 26, 1979, in a beautiful spot in the Houston Arboretum. They made many promises, including to stay together until death did them part. 
Kenny and Cynthia had two boys, Travis and Tyler. These wildly creative and intelligent young men were, and are, the joy of their lives together. They truly gained a daughter when Travis married Erin Irvin.

In June of 2015, Kenny and Cynthia became Gamma and Gampa and found a new, true calling. Kenny was a brilliant grandfather, full of stories and songs and funny noises. 

Many, many people were touched by Kenny's remarkable life. He leaves a hole in our hearts that is shaped something like an Emmy statue, a golf club, a suitcase, and a heart. 

Memorial services for Kenny, are 
scheduled for 4:00 P.M. Saturday, February 17, 2018, at First Christian Church, Tyler.

R.I.P. Kenny Boles.

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