Evan Welling Thomas II ’42

Evan died Feb. 28, 1999, on Hilton Head Island, after a long battle with multiple sclerosis.

Preparing for Princeton at Kent School, Evan was coxswain and captain of the crew that won the Henley Royal Regatta in 1938. Majoring in politics and belonging to Ivy Club, he left at the beginning of senior year to join the American Field Service. Inspired by his experiences in North Africa with the British 8th Army, he wrote a book, Ambulances in Africa. After further military service as an ensign in the U.S. Navy aboard an LST at Omaha Beach on D-Day, he returned to begin an outstanding career in book publishing after the war.

At Harper & Bros. he became e.v.p. and published a number of best-sellers, including Profiles in Courage by John F. Kennedy and The Silent World by Jacques Cousteau. In 1967, in a coup that drew a frenzy of publicity, he paid Josef Stalin's daughter, Svetlana Alliluyeva, the unprecedented sum of $1 million as an advance for her memoirs. In 1968 he became v.p. and senior editor at W.W. Norton and continued to publish notable books. He retired in 1983.

He is survived by his wife, Anne; children Wendy, Louisa, and Evan III; six grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren, to all of whom the class offers its most sincere condolences.

The Class of 1942