[4] Brought up in Devon over the World War II period, his first job was as a reporter on the Western Morning News in Plymouth where he specialised in covering transport and holiday stories.
[5] He later became a freelancer, combining journalism and radio and television reporting with fruit farming and being commissioned by the Dartington Hall Trust and others to produce reports on rural transport.
[6] His first book (for young people) was published in 1959[7] and in 1960 he produced the first book in the series he was to edit (and later publish), A Regional History of the Railways of Great Britain, The West Country.
This was run from his house at Ipplepen before moving to its better-known address at Newton Abbot railway station.
Thomas died in his sleep on 19 August 2014 at the age of 84 while on a cruise in the Baltic.