Thomas King

Thomas King (born April 24, 1943) is a Canadian writer and broadcast presenter who most often writes about First Nations. Early life and education Thomas King, who was born in Roseville, California, on April 24, 1943, claims German and Greek descent from his mother and unconfirmed and not tribally recognized Cherokee descent from his father. King says his father left the family when the boys were very young, and that they were raised almost entirely by their mother. In his series of Massey Lectures, eventually published as a book The Truth About Stories (2003), King tells that after their father's death, he and his brother learned that their father had two other families, neither of whom knew about the third. As a child, King attended grammar school in Roseville, California, and both private Catholic and public high schools. After flunking out of Sacramento State University, he joined the US Navy for a brief period of time before receiving a medical discharge for a knee injury. Following this, King worked several jobs, including as an ambulance driver, bank teller, and photojournalist in New Zealand for three years. King eventually completed bachelor's and master's degrees from Chico State University in California. He moved to Utah, where he worked as a counselor for American Indian students before completing a PhD program in English at the University of Utah. His 1971 MA thesis was on film studies. His 1986 PhD dissertation was on Native American studies, one of the earliest works to explore the oral storytelling tradition as literature. Around this time, King became interested in American Indian oral traditions and storytelling.