March 17, 2006
Thomas James Crowley
Thomas James Crowley, 1909 to 1926 (Click for a Larger View)
In my last post, I displayed what I thought to be the only surviving photo of Thomas James Crowley, one of the Crowley brothers who lived at Thunder Butte and died at the age of 17. Thomas has always been shrouded in mystery for me, and I spent a good deal of time trying to pry the details of his face from the picture I posted last month with Adobe Photoshop, as he was hidden in the shadows of the photo. While you can get some sense of what the child, Thomas, looked like, the shadows, the poor quality of the photo, and time all seemed to conspire to continue hiding him. Well, after traveling to California and finding another assortment of photos that belonged to my deceased grandmother, I found this photo of Tommy, as he would have appeared as a young man shortly before his death from appendicitis on an operating table miles from home.
I discussed what my father remembers of him and his death in a separate post one year ago, which you can find by clicking here.
--Mike Crowley
Mike Crowley Friday, March 17, 2006