IN MEMORIAM: Thomas W. Strahan July 11, 1935 - November 13, 2003.(Obituary)

We all mourn the loss of Thomas W. Strahan. He died suddenly, of a heart attack, in his home on the evening of November 13, 2003. Tom and his wife, Carol, had spent the evening at a fundraising dinner for the local crisis pregnancy center in Minneapolis. The funeral service was held at Bethlehem Baptist Church on November 18. I was able to attend the service in Minneapolis representing all of Tom's friends at the National Right to Life Committee.

I first met Tom at a Project Rachel meeting. A group of researchers had gotten together to talk about ways to improve the research output on post-abortion issues. There were a number of ideas for projects that could be undertaken by our recently organized group, the Association for Interdisciplinary Research in Values and Social Change. However, everyone was already very busy and no one wanted to take on any more work - - no one except Tom. He always had the most enthusiastic energy for work that might help save lives.

I learned that Tom was a lawyer who had been working for the Rutherford Institute putting together an annotated bibliography on post-abortion issues. He had the most wide-ranging and thorough understanding of the damage done by abortion of any individual I know. He continued to expand his bibliography over the years. It has recently been published as Detrimental Effects of Abortion: An Annotated Bibliography with Commentary by the Elliot Institute.

In 1986 we began a wonderful working relationship with Tom. He slowly began to take over the work of the association and the organization has developed the stamp of his special skills and abilities. He was the editor of the association's Research Bulletin. He was responsible for identifying pro-life researchers who could come to present their findings at the association's annual paper presentation. The quality of these meetings was due largely to his very effective work in identifying speakers.

His legal training combined with his fascination with research produced a creative output that continually amazed me. He had the ability to find issues that would make excellent research topics. He noticed very early that women who had abortions had significantly higher rates of smoking following their abortions. Since smoking was becoming known as a dangerous behavior that had been widely litigated, it was logical that any activity that increased smoking ...