Avis de décès de Thomas Hale - Nécrologie - MesAieux.com

NEW ALBANY HALE, THOMAS, was born on June 15, 1921 in New Albany, IN and died at the age of 87 on Sunday, November 2, 2008 at the home of his daughter Amy in Indianapolis, IN. After graduating from New Albany High School where he met Helen Stallings, his future wife, Tom Hale earned an engineering degree from Purdue University in 1943. In the 1950s, Hale founded the Hale Veneer Company in New Albany, designing and building large-scale veneer drying machines that are still operating in mills around the eastern United States. His secured a number of patents for his inventions in veneer dryer technology. He also contributed a design to the city of New Albany for new pipes in a major sewer renovation. Hale was a member of Kiwanis and a Mason, and served on the vestry of St Paul's Episcopal Church in New Albany. As a boy Hale was deeply interested in airplanes, and a fan of space hero Flash Gordon. During World War II, Hale joined the U.S. Army Air Force, working as an engineer in charge of building airfields in the Middle East. In 1945-46 he served in northeast India, an experience that he treasured for the rest of his life. The airfields there had been built to take the atom bomb "over the hump" of the Himalayas to Japan, should the war at sea fail to get U.S. aircraft carriers close enough for an air strike. On the long troopship voyage back across the Pacific in 1946, Hale spent his time playing poker. Thanks to his skill at five-card-stud he disembarked with a tidy nest egg. Returning home, Mr. Hale invested his part of his winnings in a pilot training course at Louisville's Bowman Field, beginning his life-long passion for flying. He soon got his license, and took his fiancée Helen for aerial joyrides every weekend. First in a biplane and then a Cessna, Hale piloted his own plane on business trips through most of the lower forty-eight United States and Canada. On many of these flights he was accompanied by his wife and some of his seven children. Tom Hale is survived by his daughters, Amy Hale and Frances Barrow; his sons John, Stephen and Philip; 11 grandchildren; and 15 great-grandchildren. A memorial visitation will be from 3-8 p.m. Friday at Kraft Funeral Service, 2776 Charlestown Rd., New Albany. Memorial service will be held 11 am Saturday at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, 1015 E. Main St., New Albany.