Cggh

Justin Olson

Thomas Merton

Thomas Merton was born on January 31, 1915 at Prades, France. Prades is in southern France. He was the son of an artist from New Zealand, Owen Merton. His mother Ruth Jenkins was also an artist but she was from the United States of America. His parents met during painting school in Paris. Ruth and Owen were married in Soho, London at St. Anne’s Church. In 1916 Thomas moved to the USA to live with his mother’s family. He lived in Douglaston, L.I. Ruth died from cancer in 1921 five years after Thomas moved there with her. In 1922 he went on a trip with his father to Bermuda. Owen went there for work, which was to paint. Three years later he moved back to France with his father. In 1926, a year after he moved back with his father, he was forced to enter Lycee Ingres. Lycee Ingres is an all boys boarding school in Montauban, France. After two years at Lycee Ingres, he is switched over to Ripley Court School for a year, which is in England. After a year at Ripley he studied at Oakham School at the age of fifteen.

Two years after he was enrolled at Oakham, a great tragedy occurred, his father died of a brain tumor. While at Oakham, he received a scholarship to Clare College, Cambridge. In the spring of 1933, he visited Italy, and spent his whole summer in the United States. In the fall he would study modern languages at Cambridge University. After attending Cambridge for a year he left and visited the US again. In 1935 he enrolled at Columbia College in New York, New York. Two years later, he was the editor of the 1937 yearbook, and he was also the art editor of the Colombia Jester. He graduated from Columbia College in 1938. At Corpus Christi Church, in 1938, he was received into the Catholic Church. From 1940 to 1941 he taught English at St. Bonaventure College, in Paris, France. December 10th 1941, Thomas went in to the Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani, in Kentucky. Our Lady of Gethsemani is a society of...