Group,
Many of you have known Tom Boldt and are aware of his serious condition!
For those that don’t, Tom was a premier painter of brass models some years
back. His main interest was scale S and I became aware of his illness, Lou
Gehrig’s disease about five years ago. He resides at a VA Home in Sandusky,
Ohio, about thirty five miles from my home. I had previously visited him about
nine to twelve months ago and left his bedside in a very depressed state. I
have know Tom since 1985, when I first became interested in scale S. He
painted my first brass purchase, a NYC 19000 series caboose that I bought from
Walt Danylak, and many more items since. As a matter of fact, Walt introduced
me to Tom. We became good friends and shared an interest in similar roads.
Because of his interest in painting, he was very knowledgeable of various road
paint schemes!
In the nineties, Tom had a run of bad luck, holding jobs for only a short
duration for various reasons. At different times, he had been employed by
Omnicon and American Models after moving west from New York. He also had
family/marital problems that weighted heavily on him! Tom began showing signs
of stress and his health began deteriorating, at my best recollection, about
ten years ago. His family was not sure if his condition was a result of
painting so many models, or his exposure to agent orange while serving his
country in Viet Nam during the 1960’s.
At any rate, my visit was not a pleasant experience, but I wanted to find
out if he was still with us. His condition is terminal and it was very
difficult standing near his side for the short period I visited him. The nurse
asked him if he recognized me and the only way she could get and
acknowledgement was to tell him to blink his eyes. He was able to do that, but
communication is impossible! I left the VA more depressed than my previous
visit and doubt I will return.
I can only tell you he is still among the living, but his condition is ever
diminishing. For those of you who knew Tom well, I would not recommend you
visit him, but please keep him in your prayers.
Sincerely,
Gary Chudzinski
