Richard A. Thomas - Hotel Executive

Richard A. "Dick" Thomas was born March 19, 1929, to Cyrus B. and Carolyn C. Thomas, of Takoma Park, Maryland. His grandparents were Stanley Thomas, Jr. and Callie May Bennett. He had three siblings, brothers, Stanley and Frank, and a sister, Dorothy. In 1932, the family left Maryland for Florida where Dick attended Mirror Lake Junior High School and St. Petersburg High. Much of his childhood was spent on a small island in nearby Tampa Bay where he hunted, fished and swam, but unknown to most, also caddied at a local golf course, starting at age 10, inspiring a lifelong love of that game. At age 20, Dick moved to Chicago to join the Hilton Hotel Corporation at the largest hotel in the world at the time, the Stevens, renamed the Conrad Hilton a few years later. From that point forward, Dick's career reads like a textbook example of how to succeed in hotel sales and tourism management. As his knowledge increased, responsibilities were expanded and his productivity soared. Dick's initiative, doggedness and charm were not lost on Hilton senior executives, who gave him increasingly daunting posts within their Statler and Biltmore divisions. It was at this time that Dick married and began his family. Continued career success lead to an offer, unrefused, by Carling Dinkler for Dick to become director of sales at Dinkler's renowned Tutwiler property in Birmingham. Dick was summarily boosted to director of sales at Dinkler's flagship Plaza Hotel in Atlanta, where Dick also oversaw sales at all 35 hotels and motels in the Dinkler chain. It was here that he coined his trademark soft-spoken phrase, "Is there anything you need anything I can do for you?" Dick's stability, family orientation and respected professional accomplishments brought him to the attention of the leadership of a city undergoing transformation from vacation-only to a blend of leisure and convention orientations. New Orleans, America's brashest city, recruited one of America's most staid hospitality executives to manage that intimidating task. Within five years, Dick's stewardship of NOLA's convention sales operation brought him once again to the notice of another world-class destination seeking to increase its rank of sustainability within the rooms' reservation scheme. Las Vegas was, at that time, reaching out to the cream of hospitality sales gurus from across the nation to join with hotel and casino executives at already famous resorts aptly named Desert Inn, Caesars Palace, Tropicana, Dunes, Sands, Thunderbird, Frontier, Flamingo and Sahara. Over the next 28 years, Dick found his way into the executive suites of several of those iconic-named properties, settling in at the crown jewel Desert Inn Country Club for close to 20 of those years, and during Las Vegas' most astounding growth and development period. Dick and his wife, Karen, created a marketing management company named Kerat in 1995, and provided sales and convention-related services for the next 11 years at the Holiday Inn Boardwalk hotel and casino. Richard A. Thomas was stalwart in his devotions to family, to profession, to colleagues and to philanthropic associations. He rose to become a SKAL International president in Las Vegas, Statewide Chairman of both the Alabama and Georgia JAYCEES, and a sustaining member in ASAE, MPI, PCMA, SITE, PATA, HSMA and JATA. He was loved and respected in each of his professional avocations.

 

 THE LINEAGE:

(Richard Alfred "Dick" Thomas was the son of Cyrus Bryan and Carolyn Calve Coates Thomas, grandson of Stanley, Jr. and Callie May Bennett Thomas and great grandson of Stanley and Emily Ann Light Thomas.  Stanley was the second child of Starkie and Mary Bridges Thomas.  Starkie was the fourth child James and Mary Standley Thomas.  Mary Bridges was the seventh child of Drury and Charity Cohoon Bridges.)