Thornton served as a fireman in the United States Navy during World War I.

[2] He also excelled as a swimmer and diver, working summers as a lifeguard at the Belle Isle Bath House.

[4] After earning his law degree at the University of Detroit in 1926, Thornton spent the summer on Mackinac Island teaching swimming.

[5] On returning to Detroit he entered private practice with Tom "Tucker" Kennedy in the Donovan Building, and later partnered with Ed Herlehy in establishing the law firm of Herlehy & Thornton located in Detroit's Hammond Building.

[8] On July 3, 1985, federal courts in Detroit, Ann Arbor, Flint, and Bay City, Michigan were closed in honor of Thornton.

[13] According to Thornton, the Society was founded "to work for improvements in the administration of justice and advancements in jurisprudence" and further to provide "a forum for an exchange of ideas and information and a setting for sociability.

[14] Each year, the Incorporated Society of Irish-American Lawyers awards a scholarship in the name of is founding president, Judge Thomas P.

[17] They lived in an apartment at 8905 E. Jefferson Avenue in Detroit, but in the summer they would close the apartment and live aboard their cabin cruiser (named "Honey") which they kept at the Detroit Yacht Club on Belle Isle.

[18] They were married at St. Paul's on the Lake, a Roman Catholic church that the judge deeply loved, and had attended for over 40 years.

[19][20] In 1987 Rose Garland Thornton was elected to the Grosse Pointe Shores Village Council where she served her community until 2008, and held the position of Mayor Pro-Tem from 2003 to 2008.