Fund manager was 50-year choir veteran

3/4/2010

Thomas Ainsworth, 89, a former director of finance at the Toledo post office and investment officer for Lucas County, died Monday in Franciscan Care Center, Sylvania, where he'd been since October.

He had pulmonary problems, family members said.

He retired in 1992 after 14 years investing and managing the county's funds. When he was hired, a longtime colleague, Francis E. "Fritz" Szollosi, a former Toledo postmaster, was a county commissioner.

Mr. Ainsworth of West Toledo retired in 1978 from the U.S. Postal Service.

He began as a clerk 37 years earlier and was later moved to the accounting department, his wife, Margie, said.

In 1968, as finance director, he became the first Toledo postal employee to receive the national Meritorious Service Award.

The Ainsworths were parents of twins, Patricia and Thomas, who were born in 1953. Mrs. Ainsworth started a local Mothers of Twins Club and in 1960 helped begin a national group.

For a decade, their home was headquarters. He'd grind out the newsletter on the hand-operated mimeograph. "He did everything he could do to get that organization rolling," his wife said.

He was born June 15, 1920, in Kirkham, England, and the family moved to Toledo in 1926. He was a 1937 graduate of Central Catholic High School. He attended the former DeSales College and the University of Toledo.

He sang bass in the Christ the King Church choir for 50 years, including a Mass in 1996 for Pope John Paul II in the Vatican. He led family sing-alongs during car trips. "Six Little Ducks" was a favorite when he and his children sang around the piano. And when friends gathered at the Ainsworths' on Saturdays, "he played the piano and people sang all evening," his wife said.

Son Tom added: "The spirit of his life was centered around music."

He was an Army veteran of World War II.

Surviving are his wife, Margie, whom he married Aug. 15, 1942; daughters, Judy Turner, Bonnie Miller, Nancy Sattler, and Patricia Hannifin; son, Thomas; brothers, Joseph and Edward; 16 grandchildren; 17 great-grandchildren, and four great-great-grandchildren.

The body will be in the Coyle Funeral Home after 2 p.m. today, with a Scripture service at 7 tonight followed by a Toledo Mothers of Twins Club service. The funeral will be at 10 a.m. tomorrow in Christ the King Church, where the body will be after 9 a.m. The family suggests tributes to the Christ the King music program or the Cherry Street Mission.