Tom was a loving father and husband. He was born in Ithaca, NY in 1963. The youngest of three boys, his father was a physics professor, and his mother was a stay-at-home mom. Tom was a good student and very active in sports, playing hockey, soccer, and cross country. After high school, Tom earned a Bachelor of Science in Political Science and Italian.
Needing to get out of the shadow of his father and two brothers, Tom headed west with his then wife Claudia, with $1500 in his pocket and an old Ford Granada. He was able to obtain employment as a logger and bought his first home, paying it off in five years on a logger’s wage.
After eight years of logging, the spotted owl controversy shut down much of the industry. He decided to enter the Line apprenticeship program, where he tested first in his class. After 3.5 years in the apprentice program, he became a journeyman lineman. He began building power lines, which he loved. In 2004, he was badly burned in an accident at work and spent 30 days in the Portland burn center. After such a traumatic accident, most linemen do not return to linework, but Tom did. He worked another 14 years as a lineman, at which time he took an early retirement.
Although Tom’s life was relatively short, he lived an amazing life. In his early years, he traveled to Europe with his family. He logged and commercial fished in Alaska and his linework took him all over the beautiful state of Oregon. He considered himself a working-class citizen and strove to be the best “human” he could be. He only wished that everyone would be their best “human,” and the fact that society didn’t reflect the best in ourselves severely disappointed him. Tom was blunt, direct, smart, complex, stubbornly authentic, and breathtakingly honest. He touched many lives in so many ways.