Katherine Agnes Thomas

Born in 1929 to Elizabeth and Allen Lynch, Kae grew up in Des Moines, Iowa along with her brother Dennis and her sister Margaret. Kae went away to college to the University of Iowa in Iowa City and graduated with a degree in Art and in History. While at the University, Kae participated in the two sports open to women at the time, golf and synchronized swimming. She went on to get her Masters in Social Working at Washington University in St. Louis. She took that degree and got a job in New York in Harlem, remarking that she was working there in 1954 when segregation was declared illegal by the Supreme Court, and that her colleagues were in disbelief that the law had passed.

Kae married Clifford Oliver Thomas in 1959. They had met at the Presbyterian Church in Iowa City while they both attended college there. They honeymooned on their drive through Canada to move to Downey, California, as Cliff had a job with Rockwell International at that time. They then moved to Fullerton, California when Cliff got a job with Autonetics, designing lens for the Apollo spaceship. It was there they had their three children, Allen Marshall Thomas, Patricia Ann Thomas, and James Thomas Thomas.

Kae was an active and supportive parent, participating in Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts, church groups, band, Pop Warner Football, and softball. Kae was a Girl Scout herself as a young girl and continued to lead troops and was a camp counselor alongside her daughter. She was a member of the Girl Scouts for 68 years.

Kae was a remarkable woman who often was ahead of the times. In college, she would go to the men’s store and buy a pants suit and get it tailored to her size. This was also about the time that she really became interested in Modern Art. This interest continued on through the years as she took her children to see Peter Max at a gallery opening and to the Museum of Modern Art for an exhibit of room-size macrame art. She dabbled in ceramics, took a wood working class at Fullerton College for decades in which she made doors, clocks, desks, side tables and chests. She started learning how to silk screen, and this became a lucrative side business for years. Kae could often be found fixing cars, plumbing, doing electrical work, mowing the lawn, replacing windows and the like.

Kae was an avid reader, passing along that life-long interest to her children, and played bridge with the same group of women every month for decades. She found her true passion in life in the early 1980’s, when she became a Farmer’s Market Manager, which she continued to do through her mid 80’s. She attended State and National conferences, at one time managed three different markets, and helped to integrate the WIC program into the Southern California markets so low income families could shop at the markets for fresh produce with Food Stamps.

Kae is survived by her three children: Allen Marshall Thomas in Omaha, Nebraska, Patricia Ann Thomas in Minneapolis, Minnesota and James Thomas Thomas in Corona, California . Kae was predeceased by her husband, Clifford Oliver Thomas, in 1976.