John Parnell THOMAS, Congress, NJ (1895-1970)

THOMAS John Parnell , a Representative from New Jersey; born in Jersey City, Hudson County, N.J., January 16, 1895; attended the public schools of Allendale, N.J., the high school at Ridgewood, N.J., and the University of Pennsylvania at Philadelphia; during the First World War served overseas as a second lieutenant in Company B, Three Hundred and Sixth Infantry, and first lieutenant and captain in Headquarters, Regimental Staff of the Fiftieth Infantry, 1917-1919; engaged in investment securities pursuits 1920-1938 and in the insurance business in New York City since 1938; member of the borough council of Allendale, N.J., in 1925; mayor of Allendale 1926-1930; member of State house of assembly 1935-1937; elected as a Republican to the Seventy-fifth and to the six succeeding Congresses and served from January 3, 1937, until his resignation January 2, 1950, following conviction on charges of salary fraud; chairman, Committee on Un-American Activities (Eightieth Congress); editor and publisher of three weekly newspapers in Bergen County, N.J., 1951-1955; real estate solicitor in 1955 and 1956; defeated for the Republican nomination for Congress in 1954; engaged in investment securities; moved to St. Petersburg, Fla., where he died November 19, 1970; cremated; ashes interred in Elmgrove Cemetery, Mystic, Conn.

Bibliography

Carlson, Lewis H. ``J. Parnell Thomas and the House Committee on Un-American Activities, 1938-1948.'' Ph.D. diss., Michigan State University, 1967.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present