About the author

Thomas is an octogenarian, gardener, oil painter of landscapes and religious art. He was born during the depression era, grew up in the Ohio countryside until the second world war when his father, Clarence, was drafted into the U.S. Navy to serve in the South Pacific. He moved to Pittsburgh with his mother, Mildred, and brother, David, to be near her parents and siblings.

Following the war, Thomas and family returned to Ohio. He studied for the Catholic priesthood, abandoned that pursuit, joined the U.S. Army, eventually married and enrolled in the School of Applied Social Sciences at Case-Western University in Cleveland, Ohio. Thomas served as a social worker in public welfare, a VA medical center, a VA domiciliary, on Indian reservations in Nevada, and in service to reservations in Nevada, Arizona, and Utah.

As a U.S. Public Health Services officer, he then served tribes all across the nation as a consultant in alcoholism and substance abuse writing articles in the Public Health Reports, the National Journal of American Indian and Alaskan Native Mental Health, and the Indian Health Service Provider. He has other degrees in alcohol studies and health administration.

Thomas married a second time to Maria from the Ysleta Pueblo in El Paso, Texas. After retirement, Thomas eventually studied for the Roman Catholic diaconate in Washington, D.C., and was ordained in Santa Fe, New Mexico in 2004. His last assignment was at San Ysidro Catholic Parish in Corrales, NM. Thomas and Maria have been a team serving parishioners for 32 years. Together, Thomas and Maria have four children and six grandchildren.