Thomas Hubert Fitzgerald

The son of Thomas Aloisius Fitzgerald and Olivia Ashcroft, Tom was born in Jersey City and spent much of his youth in Brooklyn. At the age of 16, following his father’s sudden death, he went to work for Western Union delivering telegrams throughout Manhattan in order to support his mother and two siblings. Within a short time, he was promoted to international radio operator, mastered the art of Morse code, and spent the early years of World War II sending and receiving telegrams.

Tom joined the Army in 1944 after being accepted into officers’ candidate school. He deployed first to southern France and later Germany. During the Occupation, he served in the Army Intelligence Corps headquartered in Berlin.

Upon returning stateside, Tom earned a degree in economics from City College of New York and pursued graduate courses at the University of Wisconsin. He then enrolled at the University of Michigan, where he received a master’s degree in the relatively new field of Organizational Analysis.

Following a year in Detroit as an economic analyst for the U.S. government, he was recruited to General Motors’ 2management track program. His first assignment was in Flint, where he helped to open several new plants and develop a sales forecasting system. From there, he moved to the company’s headquarters in Detroit and later handled special assignments at the GM Tech Center.

During the ‘70s, Tom was part of a forward-looking team that introduced the emerging concept of organizational development to GM. As executive-on-loan to the City of Detroit during a fiscal crisis, he worked to cultivate managerial talent and streamline departments. He also served as consultant-on-loan to the Southeast Michigan Health Care Coalition. In the early ‘80s, he worked closely with the management team responsible for launching GM’s Saturn division, “a different kind of car company.”

Tom retired from General Motors in 1984 and, that same year, began carving out a second career for himself as a public-intellectual-at-large. Over the course of the next 30 years, he published more than two dozen articles and essays in scholarly journals on topics ranging from bio-ethics to the flaws of election polling, and from linguistics to anthropology. A sampling of his work can be found at http://thepublicscholar.com.

Among his civic activities, Tom was co-founder of Huron Homes for Youth, which later became Huron Services for Youth. He was also an avid fan of A2ethics.org and contributed a podcast to the site.

During their 38 years together, he and Linda traveled extensively. Tom developed a deep and abiding affinity for the American Southwest, particularly New Mexico, for remote parts of California discovered during visits to his children and grandchildren, and for Michigan’s upper peninsula, where he and Linda made many happy trips. Tom also enjoyed accompanying his brother Quentin on cross-country “museum crawls.”

As much as he loved travel, Tom loved his home in Dexter even more and devoted countless hours to gardening and building projects. He also turned up regularly in Ann Arbor Art Center classes, where he developed considerable skills as an amateur potter and sculptor.

Tom will be remembered for many qualities: his free-roaming, far-ranging and often astonishing intellect, his generosity, his hospitality, his exuberant love of life, his eloquence, his courtly manners and unfailing courtesy, his inexhaustible curiosity, his gourmet cooking, his knowledge of music, his passion for great art. But above all, he will be cherished and remembered for being one of this world’s truly good men.

In addition to his wife, Tom is survived by his sister Paula Wilkes, his daughters Ellen (Murtha) and Leslie (Swartz), his son Thomas Jr., his grandsons Michael, Christopher, Gregory and Russell, by his nephew, nieces and cousins, and by an array of friends who will hold him forever in their hearts.

A visitation will be held at 2 p.m. on Saturday, February 27, at Zion Lutheran Church of Ann Arbor, with the funeral service immediately following. Interment will take place at the Great Lakes National Cemetery in Holly, Michigan.

Memorial gifts in Tom’s honor may be made to Zion Lutheran Church of Ann Arbor, Lutheran World Relief or Friends in Deed.