Lao Beifong

"earth"

- The Avatar has kidnapped my daughter. I want you to do whatever it takes to bring her home.

Lao Bei Fong is Toph's father and a wealthy figure in the Earth Kingdom village of Gaoling. He is married to Poppy Bei Fong.

Lao Bei Fong cares deeply for his daughter and only wishes for her safety, but was far too overprotective of her, even going as far as hiding her existence from the rest of the town.

History
Toph's father cared deeply for his daughter but failed to recognize what was best for her. He thought her handicap, blindness, made her weak and frail. Due to his fear, he was unaware of Toph's Earthbending skills until he saw her in combat. The fear for her increased when he witnessed her mastery of Earthbending. Seeing that she was a master Earthbender only reinforced in his mind that she should be guarded even more closely. While Lao did love Toph, he was extremely overprotective and this drove her to run away from home. When Toph ran away to teach the Avatar, he assumed she was kidnapped by him and commissioned Xin Fu, the promoter of the Earth Rumble VI Earthbending tournament, and Master Yu, Toph's Earthbending teacher, to do "whatever it takes" to rescue her. Toph sends a letter to both her parents using Sokka's messenger hawk, but no reply is received.

Relatives

 * Poppy Bei Fong (wife)
 * Toph Bei Fong (daughter)

Trivia

 * According to Toph's passport in The Serpent's Pass and the fake letter from her mother in The Earth King, Bei Fong is written as 北方 and when put after 老(lào) translates as Old North or Mr. North.
 * According to "Avatar Extras", the prestigious Bei Fong family is not the richest in the world, or the Earth Kingdom for that matter. They are, however, the wealthiest and most influential family in the southern Earth Kingdom.