My father, Alun Thomas, who has died aged 98, was a teacher at the same school in Leicestershire for three decades. Later he became a wholehearted member of the village in Derbyshire to which he retired, and was also a respected Liberal Democrat politician in local government.
The youngest of five children, Alun was born in Barry, south Wales, to Raymond Thomas and his wife, Rebecca (nee Edwards), and attended Barry grammar school before taking a clerical job with the flour merchants Joseph Rank in Cardiff. As soon as he was 18 he volunteered for the Royal Navy and served in the Fleet Air Arm as a rear gunner and radio operator in the second world war.
In peacetime he did a teacher training course in Llandrindod Wells, married my mother, Mary (nee Hurst), whom he had met when they were both in the Fleet Air Arm, and took a post at Castle Donington secondary modern (later high) school in Leicestershire. He taught history and geography there for 34 years, the last 12 as deputy head, keeping the school running harmoniously through three changes of head.
Alun’s marriage to Mary ended in 1972, and in 1977 he married his teaching colleague Joyce Robinson. In 1982 he retired and the couple moved to Winster in the Peak District. There Alun threw himself into the village community with his usual enthusiasm, joining the Morris dancers and the choir, starting a luncheon club and running the community hall. He was also elected to the parish council and, as a Liberal Democrat, to Derbyshire Dales district council, serving as chair of housing and finally as chair of the council.
In 1999 Joyce died suddenly, and Alun lived alone from then on. A stroke in 2008 ended his dancing and gradually his mobility reduced with arthritis and other complications. But this did not reduce his sociability or his keen interest in people.
Although he had been retired for 40 years, on his death the tributes from former pupils came pouring in, with one typically remembering him as “an absolute treasure, a caring and passionate teacher and a true gent”.
He is survived by his three children, Jane, Caroline and me, from his first marriage, Joyce’s daughters, Hazel and Jackie, from a previous marriage, nine grandchildren and five great-granddaughters.
