Dr. Thomas was a wonderful man and a brilliant scientist, and im fairly certain the Dr. threw the mould away when he was born. Pete hired me to collect and raise colonies of leafhoppers for his final project with BLTVA in the spring of 2003 until his retirement. He told me "you see a road you've never been down before, drive it!" Hands down the coolest boss ive ever had. He taught me sooo much, basically giving me an education people pay big bucks for. Ill miss the old guy. My condolances to his children and family..

I have very fond memories of Dr. Pete working with him during the nineties when we were testing our leafroll resistant potatoes with Naturemark, Monsanto. I remember Dr. Pete as a very knowledgeable and passionate person and, indeed, a great story teller. Reading now, his story, brought a smile to my face. Rest in Peace.

As a potato virologist myself, I had the pleasure to know and admire Dr Pete Thomas scientific work on potato and tomato viruses. Besides the great amount of contributions to Luteoviruses, mainly Potato leafroll virus (PLRV), on many epidemiological, detection and control studies, I will always remember him as a very kindly and helpful scientist. Back in 1996-97, Dr. Pete Thomas kindly and promptly attended my personnal request for PLRV primarily and secondarily infected potato tubers. That was a great help as it is acknowledged in the paper originated from that research ( AJPR (1999) 76: 209-213).
Rest in peace Dr. Pete Thomas!

Best regards
José

José Alberto Caram de Souza Dias (Eng. Agr. PhD)
(Brazil)

Sadly missed by a old friend, Went to school together play and dome some hunting together, Have not seen him in25 years, So proud to no that a oldOdin boy made good, Sorry for your lost Darlene and his children.  P.J. Spitler . Odin Illinois,