Grahame Robert Thom was born in Sydney to
Robert Alexander Thom and Lillian Merle Lane.
He went to school at Mosman and North Sydney. His dad was a tram conductor on the North Shore trams and mum worked in lots of situations. His sister Carole lives in Brisbane with her family.
Grahame decided he would like to be a land surveyor and worked as an “apprentice” with a surveying firm in Sydney, while studying surveying for over two years but found that he could not pass one of the subjects as he has no depth of vision. Grahame then joined the Commonwealth Public Service, first working as a clerk with the Department of Civil Aviation in Sydney. He came to realise that to obtain promotion it was best to work in Canberra.
The first position Grahame applied for and obtained was as a Cost Clerk at the Government Printing Office in Canberra. He worked in several agencies in Canberra until 1991 when he was appointed as Deputy Commissioner of the Tasmanian Branch of the Department of Veterans’ Affairs. In 1995 Grahame was transferred to DVA Melbourne and retired there in 2001.
While in Canberra Grahame studied first at the Canberra Technical College obtaining accounting and cost accounting certificates, and then successfully undertook part time study at the Australian National University obtaining an Economics degree. He is a Fellow of CPA Australia.
Grahame married in Sydney in 1964 and has three children, Kathy, Michael and Louise. After separating in 1990 Grahame married Rosslyn Maria McKean in Canberra in 1992, gaining another daughter Melissa. All up there are eight grandchildren.
In recent years Grahame has been a member and Treasurer of the Kilmore Hospital Board and the Mitchell Community Health Service.
Grahame’s interest in genealogy started in 1968 when he read an article in an issue of the Reader’s Digest Magazine about researching your family history. Grahame realised that he knew nothing about his ancestors other than his parents and grandparents.
Grahame joined the Heraldry and Genealogy Society of Canberra in 1972, then the Society of Australian Genealogists in 1974. He saw an item in a Sydney newspaper about the Clan MacThomas and joined the Clan Society in 1975. Jack Thoms was the Australian Branch Secretary at that time. In 1983 Grahame attended the Clan Gathering in Centennial Park, Sydney, held in the presence of our Chief.
As a result of tracing back all his ancestors in Australia Grahame now knows that he is 51.5% English, 28.1% Scottish, 18.8% Irish and 1.6% Welsh. One of his achievements is knowing the names of all the ships on which his 27 ancestors came to Australia during the period 1790 to 1883. Grahame has had many successes and still have some brick walls he would like to solve. His favourite ancestor is probably Obadiah Ikin, a NSW Corps sergeant who arrived in Sydney with his family on the ship Surprize in 1790. He has managed to get one line back to the 10th century in England, the Ashbys of Leicestershire, though without sufficient proof.
In more recent times the internet has created a lot more opportunities to discover new information. Grahame has established that his ancestor Thomas Wardle is from Sunderland in County Durham, but could not find his birth. As he strongly believes in taking every opportunity to publicise your research interests, he has his own family tree web site. Many people have contacted Grahame because of this, including a cousin from Perth. She was able to say that Thomas was born on either 7 December 1841 or 1840 in Sunderland. This lead to establishing that Thomas’ father was William and his grandfather Thomas Page Wardle.
Grahame then found that Thomas senior, born in Sunderland, had joined the Royal Navy in 1795. By 1805 he was on the HMS Euryalus and took part in the Battle of Trafalgar. He later served on a number of ships including HMS Victory. Such are the fruits of family history.
The other joy is being able to visit the sites of importance in the life of your ancestors. He has travelled to the UK twice to visit the towns of his ancestors and to undertake research.
Grahame feels that serious researchers should support their interest by being volunteers. He has presented papers at the three yearly Australasian Conferences, and held various positions such as President of the Heraldry and Genealogy Society of Canberra, Secretary and Treasurer of the Australasian Federation of Family History Associations, State Treasurer of the Tasmanian Family History Society and lately President of the Kilmore Historical Society. He also teaches family history with the local U3A group.
Grahame has attended two Clan gatherings in Glenshee. Following raising the issue of what was the condition of past records of the Clan MacThomas Society at the 2004 AGM, he was appointed as chair of the Society’s Archives Committee, together with Pamela Thom of England and Hamish Thoms of Canada. They have made steady progress in developing archives policies and procedures for the Society.
In May 2010 Grahame was appointed to the role of Clan Sennachie by the 19th Chief of Clan MacThomas, Andrew MacThomas of Finegand.
Grahame is a Fellow of the Heraldry and Genealogy Society of Canberra and has compiled five cemetery transcription volumes published by the Society. He has also published four small books about his Ikin ancestors and held an Ikin family gathering in Sydney in 1990. Some of Grahame’s research can be seen on his web site at http://mc2.vicnet.net.au/home/grthom/web/index.html. Graham has also made substantial contributions to the Clan Society website.
Added at launch
Updated 10/05/2010