Thomas Golladay Evans was born on October 17, 1923 in Old Hickory, Tennessee, a suburb of Nashville. He was the son of John Towles Evans, a native of Lafayette, Alabama and Sarah Elizabeth Golladay, a native of Trigg County, Kentucky. His only sibling was his brother, John Towles Evans, Jr., who was born in 1921.
Tom grew up in Nashville and entered Vanderbilt University where he earned a degree in electrical engineering. In 1945 he went to work for the Westinghouse Electric Company where he worked for 37 years. At that time, Westinghouse was rebuilding infrastructure shattered during World War II and bringing power to countries that had none. During those 37 years, Tom Evans became a dynamic Westinghouse engineer who helped build power plants and desalination facilities around the globe.
On December 26, 1945 Tom married Elaine Lataste Killebrew, a Vanderbilt graduate from Anniston, Alabama. Tom and Elaine had met when they were both freshmen at Vanderbilt. They became the parents of three daughters, Susan Evans, born in 1946, Sarah Evans, born in 1949 and Vivian Evans, born in 1950.
Tom and Elaine moved to New York City and for the next 27 years Tom worked in engineering, construction and marketing of power plants around the world. Business travel took him to over 50 countries, often for weeks or months. His longer stays included trips to the Philippines, Japan, Brazil, Mexico, Haiti, Thailand, Sweden, Switzerland, Spain, Egypt, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and Australia. In 1972 he and Elaine moved to Brussels where Tom served as President of Westinghouse Electric Nuclear Energy Systems Europe for three years. He retired in 1982 after heading up strategic planning in Pittsburgh. Tom and Elaine raised their three daughters in Glen Rock, New Jersey, where he opened the eyes of his family to the international world with his exciting travel stories.
As Tom wrote in a Vanderbilt alumni magazine: "I was robbed by a Moro tribesman with a wicked-looking dagger on an inter-island freighter in Philippine waters; nearly drowned off the coast of Africa and barely escaped a murderous mob in Lagos, Nigeria, that was angered over the 1960 assassination of Congo leader Patrice Lumumba. I stayed in a hotel in New Delhi that had open windows that had monkeys climbing in my room. I argued the pros and cons of democracy for three hours with the Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza, and made a presentation on nuclear power plants to a utility company in Hiroshima, Japan, after the president of the utility opened the meeting by telling me his wife and children had been killed by the atomic bomb."
When Cuba's Fidel Castro shut off the water to the U.S. base at Guantanamo in 1964, the Navy called Westinghouse, and Tom was dispatched to Washington. At that time, the Navy had three tankers continuously hauling water to Guantanamo, and it wanted desalination plants built at Guantanamo within six month. Under Tom’s direction, Westinghouse disassembled a plant it had recently built in California, and the plant was reassembled and two similar plants were built within six months at Guantanamo.
After his retirement from Westinghouse, Tom and Elaine moved to Alpharetta, Georgia where he worked for many years in community projects. Tom died on January 12, 2011 in Naples, Florida from complications following a stroke. He was buried in the Highland Cemetery in Anniston, Alabama next to his wife, Elaine, who died in 2008.
Tom Evans Tombstone
LINEAGE: (Thomas Golladay Evans was the son of John Towles and Sarah Elizabeth Golladay Evans, grandson of James Richard and Ida Thomas Golladay and great-grandson of Alfred Marshall and Eliza Anne Martin Thomas. Alfred Marshall was the fifth child of Starkie and Mary Bridges Thomas. Starkie was the fourth child of James and Mary Standley Thomas. Mary was the seventh child of Drury and Charity Cohoon Bridges. )
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