Kathleen Calhoun Thompson

Kathleen Calhoun Thompson died peacefully at her home in Washington, D.C., on May 15, 2025. She was born in Washington in 1938 to Edward C. and Katherine W. Crouch. The family relocated to Erie and then Philadelphia while her father served as a Naval Officer during World War II. At the end of the war, they moved back to Washington and her father joined the U.S. Foreign Service. Much of Kathleen’s childhood was then spent abroad, including two years in Bogotà, Colombia, where she attended the Colegio Nueva Granada, and four years in Paris, where she attended the American Community School and Marymount International School. After her family returned to Washington in 1954, she finished high school at Wilson (now Jackson-Reed) and then attended George Washington University, graduating with a degree in English in 1961. She spent a memorable summer working at the U.S. pavilion at the 1958 World’s Fair in Brussels.

In the following years, she spent time living in Washington, where she worked at the Pan American Union, and abroad, including in Geneva and Brussels, where she worked at the U.S. Information Agency as a Foreign Service Secretary. She first met Richard S. Thompson in Geneva, where he was part of a U.S. delegation to the Conference on Disarmament. In November 1969 they were married in the Washington National Cathedral, followed by a honeymoon in Puerto Rico.

Because of Richard’s career as a Foreign Service Officer, they lived in Saigon (1969-1972 and 1974-1975), Paris (1972-1974), and Algiers (1980-1982) before settling back in their home on Worthington Drive in Bethesda. It was during this time that Kathleen’s three children were born, John and Francesca at the U.S. Army 3rd Field Hospital in Saigon and Alexander at the American Hospital of Paris. Among many memorable adventures during their time abroad, the family was evacuated prior to the fall of Saigon in 1975 (Richard remained until the end, April 29, 1975, when he was airlifted from the roof of the U.S. Embassy).

In 1989, Kathleen joined the Foreign Service herself as a secretary and was posted over the next several years in Amman, Tel Aviv and Paris. During the 1991 Gulf War, the State Department was looking for volunteers to help staff the embassy in Tel Aviv, which was under threat from Scud missiles fired from Iraq. Kathleen, always eager to travel, answered the call. She worked at the State Department in Washington during her final years in the Foreign Service but looked for opportunities to join the teams that accompany the Secretary of State abroad, which took her to Albania, Kazakhstan, Italy and France.

Kathleen enjoyed travel, music, painting, and spending time with her family, especially her five grandchildren. She had a keen sense of humor and will be remembered for her laughter. A Francophile of the first order, she spent time in France whenever possible and spoke excellent French (and very good Spanish). She was known to say things like, “Where I come from [meaning France], we eat the salad after the main course.”

She is survived by her brother Edward Crouch and his wife Elizabeth of Grand Rapids, Michigan; her three children, John and his wife Agnes of Bethesda, Francesca of Washington, and Alexander and his wife Jennifer Lange of Columbus, Ohio; and five grandchildren, Stella, Sophia, Lucy, Roxanne, and Theo. She was predeceased by her son-in-law James Zinn and her niece Katherine Crouch.