BY LARA WARREN

AT 100 YEARS OLD, the Rev. O.D. Thomas has no plans for slow­ing down.

“I’m look­ing for­ward to the next hun­dred years,” laughs Thomas, who cel­e­brated his 100th birth­day in Decem­ber. The Uni­ver­sity of Alabama alum­nus and Tuscaloosa res­i­dent has been the cen­ter of a flurry of media atten­tion since reach­ing this mile­stone. “I may not under­stand why this hap­pened — turn­ing 100 — but I’m glad it did,” he says.

Thomas’ fam­ily and friends held a party for his birth­day, and Tuscaloosa County and the cities of North­port, Ala., and Tuscaloosa declared Dec. 3 “O.D. Thomas Day.”

Thomas MA ’51 is flat­tered by all of the atten­tion. “If they can stand it, I can,” he jokes.

Otis Daniel Thomas was born in 1898 in Tal­ladega County near Childer­s­burg, Ala. The son of a sawmill oper­a­tor, he spent his child­hood in Mis­sis­sippi, Texas and Alabama. He grad­u­ated from Coosa County’s Rock­ford High School in 1921. The school prin­ci­pal once told Thomas that “he was cut out to be a preacher.”

“I told him, ‘I might be cut out to be a preacher, but I think I’m sewed up all wrong,’” Thomas remembers.

After grad­u­at­ing from high school, Thomas became a school­teacher in Chilton County. He said he felt God’s call­ing to the min­istry, so at the end of that school year, he enrolled at Birmingham-Southern Col­lege to study the min­istry. He received a bachelor’s degree from there in 1925, and then moved on to South­ern Methodist Uni­ver­sity in Dallas.

It was there he met his future wife, Clytie Mae Wom­ack, there study­ing to become a mis­sion­ary. He earned his bach­e­lor of divin­ity degree from there in 1927, and the next year, he and Clytie Mae mar­ried. They remained mar­ried until her death in 1993.

He says he misses her greatly.

“The other day, I was wish­ing so hard for Clytie Mae to be here with me,” Thomas says. “I was won­der­ing what she would think about all of this hoopla,” he says, refer­ring to turn­ing 100. “I think she’d be so proud of me.”

The 5-foot-8-inch, 134 pound cen­te­nar­ian has a quick wit and zest for life unmatched by many a frac­tion of his age. Thomas has served as chap­lain at Sky­land Oaks Retire­ment Cen­ter in Tuscaloosa since he and his late wife moved there in 1986, and he preaches reg­u­larly ant the center’s non­de­nom­i­na­tional Sun­day wor­ship ser­vices. He also coun­sels res­i­dents and speaks fre­quently to church and senior cit­i­zens’ groups.

“I’ve just tried to live a decent, clean life,” he says. He avoids caf­feine and rarely eats meat or sweets. He has never smoked a cig­a­rette or tasted alco­hol. His daily rou­tine begins with 150 bounces on the mini tram­po­line in the cor­ner of his room at Sky­land Oaks. It must be work­ing — he says he doesn’t have a sin­gle pain in his body. The only ail­ment he has devel­oped over the years is loss of sight, caused by mac­u­lar degen­er­a­tion, a con­di­tion that has left him legally blind. That that hasn’t stopped him from preach­ing — he deliv­ers his Sun­day ser­mons from mem­ory. And instead of read­ing, he lis­tens to books on tape.

Thomas has been a min­is­te­r­ial mem­ber of the North Alabama Con­fer­ence of the United Methodist Church since 1922. Hav­ing served for more than 76 years, he is the longest serv­ing of all liv­ing con­fer­ence members.

Last year the Alabama Chap­lains Asso­ci­a­tion rec­og­nized him as the state’s old­est active insti­tu­tional chap­lain, and named him the association’s first hon­orary life member.

Thomas was the first chap­lain at Bryce Hos­pi­tal, a state men­tal hos­pi­tal in Tuscaloosa. His appoint­ment to the chap­laincy there was made by the hos­pi­tal super­in­ten­dent, Dr. James Sid­ney Tar­wa­ter, who in 1951 wel­comed Thomas as “a pio­neer in spir­i­tual min­istry to the men­tally ill.”

“I had never been to Bryce before except for a short visit,” Thomas said of his appoint­ment to Bryce. “I had no idea what it was going to be like. I was some­what appre­hen­sive. Yet it turned out tot be a bless­ing in dis­guise, and I sptn a ery happy 14 years there.” He remained at Bryce until retir­ing at age 66.

Thomas was at Bryce dur­ing a time when liv­ing con­di­tions in men­tal hos­pi­tals were far from idea. One of the main parts of his job was the break down the mis­con­cep­tions of the men­tally ill. One day, he vis­ited a ward with about 50 nearly out-of-control patients. IN an effort to calm them, he tried com­mu­ni­cat­ing with them through music. It worked, and the music seemed to have a calm­ing effect.

Before long, Thomas was tot­ing a record player and Ten­nessee Ernie Ford records from ward to ward. After they were calmed by the music, Thomas would preach and quote scrip­ture to the patients. After a few weeks of the rou­tine, the nor­mally unruly patients would sit down and lis­ten atten­tively to Thomas. He said that many were saved that way.

He worked hard to break down the com­mon stereo­types of the day—that the men­tally ill couldn’t talk, couldn’t com­pre­hend and couldn’t accept spir­i­tual ideas.

“I tried to do what I thought Jesus would have done for the men­tally ill,” he said. “I helped them build pride in them­selves. I made an effort to know every patient by name and make each one feel important.”

Thomas wrote a book about his expe­ri­ences at Bryce, Through These Eyes: My Min­istry to the Men­tally Ill, pub­lished in 1996. He says that he is now work­ing on his auto­bi­og­ra­phy. “If I don’t write it now, I’ll for­get it,” he laughs.

Thomas and his wife had three sons: Larry ’58, an Atlanta pho­tog­ra­pher; Bruce Orland ’55, MA ’58, a retired edu­ca­tor liv­ing in Mobile; and Al, MA ’58, a retired com­mu­ni­ca­tions pro­fes­sional liv­ing in Birm­ing­ham. Clytie Mae was also a beloved fig­ure in the Uni­ver­sity com­mu­nity, and attended the col­lege for a while. She also served as long­time senior activ­i­ties direc­tor for Tuscaloosa Parks and Recre­ation Author­ity, and was active in the United Methodist Woman for more than 50 years.

One might expect a man who has lived through 18 U.S. pres­i­dents, two World Wars and a mul­ti­tude of tech­no­log­i­cal advances to have com­pli­cated advice about how to live a long life.

“I just keep breath­ing,” he says. “It seems to be working.”

Alabama Alumni Magazine, 1999