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Tuesday January 24, 2012 Edition
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‘Jack of All Trades and Master of None’ Sharing Memories of Robert Thomas

One role in his life that Bob never tired of was his defense of his country in two wars.
photo provided
One role in his life that Bob never tired of was his defense of his country in two wars.
Always most at home on the sea or in the air, Bob called Addison County his home, but took any chance to explore the world.
photo provided
Always most at home on the sea or in the air, Bob called Addison County his home, but took any chance to explore the world. "Life is to be lived and you can't win if you don't play," Bob would say.
If you were looking for Bob on Memorial Day he was at the parade, in uniform, saluting Old Glory as she passed by.
photo provided
If you were looking for Bob on Memorial Day he was at the parade, in uniform, saluting Old Glory as she passed by.

Tuesday January 24, 2012

By Cookie Steponaitis

There are people you meet whose personalities are vibrant and so individualistic, they become indelibly impressed in your consciousness even if you only meet them once. Robert Thomas was one of those people. It was not a question if there were stories to tell but simply when to tell them. Bob was born in January, 1915 in the coal country and was a second generation American. Growing up in a rural town where the mine offered the only form of steady employment, Bob took an alternate path and first went into the seminary with plans of becoming a priest. Just a few months shy of accomplishing that goal, Bob again changed direction and did a four year stint performing in a little known Vaudeville act with another unknown of the time, Ed McMahon. While Bob would never loose his love of theater, dance and song, life again presented him with alternate career paths.

When Pearl Harbor galvanized the nation into action, Bob enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Corp during World War II and found himself in Europe and a tail gunner in a B-24 bomber. His commanding officer in the plane was American movie actor Jimmy Stewart and during the last months of his life, Bob’s family friend Lisa Sprague, wrote to the actor and asked him to correspond with Bob before his passing. Stewart reminisced with Bob in a series of three letters about their missions in Europe and remarked, “I was delighted to hear from your friend of your still being among us and often think back to those times in the air when we were not certain of the next second or even the next mission. I have learned to cherish life and reminisce with those of us still alive and mobile. Those were times that defined all of us as people and we still carry both the scars and the pride.”

Bob was a force of nature to the people of Addison County who knew him and a man who always spoke his mind, whether socially acceptable or not. “If you don’t want to know, then for God’s sake don’t ask me,” he was fond of saying and often sparked debate, dispute and discussion at town and civic meetings. Blessed or cursed as he liked to call it with a near photographic memory, Bob’s most intriguing skill included an uncanny ability to observe people and be incredibly accurate about what made them tick. He used to call it people watching and loved to engage in conversations with strangers and would drop a one line controversial comment to, ‘stir the pot’ as Bob liked to tell it. He would then take opposing views, switching opinions and arguing multiple points, just to keep the conversation moving and lively. “It never is enough to just know what you think,” stated Bob. “You have to know why and what the others feel as well.”

As a gourmet chef Bob had few equals in the kitchen in his ability to create new dishes and had a cunning method for distributing labor in his kitchen. When his health failed the huge kitchen table at his home became the hub of gatherings of all sizes and at all times of night. The people who ate meals and ‘visited’ were also invited into the kitchen to help. Unbeknownst to them they prepared all the vegetables and prep cook responsibilities. Bob would dominate the kitchen to prepare the meal and then be suspiciously absent when it came time for clean up. The guests, after dessert and dialogue also cleaned up. With a grin Bob would simply state, “Great chefs create, they do not clean up.” During his life Bob cooked not only on local television as the Vermont Galloping Gourmet, but also on a world class ocean liner for the Queen of England and occasionally would create ice sculptures at Stowe resorts.

Bob also traversed the back roads of Addison County As a traveling salesman, and spent hours visiting with farmers, hunters, shop owners, politicians and even the most argumentative individuals each town laid claim to and within minutes there was a relationship developed that seemed to have been years in the making. Bob loved people and he never tired of learning what made them tick as individuals. A self admitted Jack of All Trades and Master of None, Bob moved from career to career and continued a long time commitment to the U.S. military serving in World War II and in Korea, sold the first color photos in the nation, sold radio advertisements and would often disappear for lengths of time on tasks bringing home an unlikely assortment of people from strange places in the world.

Fascinated by the advances in technology he often reminisced about his childhood remarking, “If anyone had told me as a boy that I would have lived to see man land on the moon I would have scoffed at them as simply insane.” Bob refused to use computers and until his death in 1989 claimed there was something to be said for the firm grasp of a hand, the chuckle of a friend and eye contact that comes from spending time together and taking on a subject. One game he delighted in playing was called Finish the Line. When someone would visit him and the conversation lagged a bit, he would challenge them to go and select any of the hundreds of books on his shelves. They would open to a page at random and start reading a paragraph. After several minutes of thinking, Bob would finish the paragraph for them almost verbatim which usually sparked the conversation and Bob would settle in for another marathon debate, argument and loud discussion.

The longtime friends of Bob always chided him for not writing a book about his unique travels and life long charge of standing on the soil of each nation in the world before he died. Bob simply would shrug, grin, and drawl. “They never wrote a definitive book on how to live life, so I kind of have been winging it all these years, and besides,” he concluded, “we’re a lot safer if we wait until I’m gone, because then people can get all excited and most of it won’t be a secret anymore.” One chapter he intended to devote to the procedures in properly honoring St. Patrick’s Day which he considered a world holiday. Since Bob considered himself to be 115% Irish, he called St. Patrick’s Day the great equalizer. “Everyone in the world wishes they were a bit Irish,” he proclaimed, “and on St. Patty’s day, for just a while, they get their wish.” Another chapter was to be how to tell bar jokes in the seven different languages Bob spoke and how to improvise in situations you suddenly found yourself in.

When Bob died in 1989, he had lived a life most people found eccentric, a huge bit on the wild side and one of considerable interest because it spanned two wars, saw America become a world power and the rise of industry and technology. While Bob lived through all of it he was reticent about the changes that took people away from simply sitting down and talking. His fascination with people never waned and although his illnesses forced him to live the last 18 months of his life in the ICU at Fletcher Allen he became the “oracle” of the floor for generations of nurses who wanted to share their lives with him. Whether he was telling a person’s fortune, arguing for the sake of debate, stirring up a controversy or just making a meal for friends, Bob lived by the one ideal that never faded, “This country has to stay strong. It isn’t enough to talk about it, we have to do it.” Words that transcend time from a man whose adventures and stories continue to be the talk of those who knew him and hear about him today. The book that promised memories of a life that Bob called the testimonies of the church of what is happening now, is somewhere in the works, down the road a piece, just out of sight, but not out of mind, just like Bob. And, this reporter would know because Bob Thomas is her father.

 


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