Thomas G. Cassidy

OBITUARY
LOWELL - Thomas G. Cassidy, 77, of Lowell, MA, a World War II Veteran who saw service as a United States Navy medical corpsman attached to the First Marine Division, died Saturday, September 3, 2005 in Lowell from lung cancer, according to family members.
He was born on Minnesota's Mesabi Iron Range on September 7, 1927, son of the late Thomas C. and Margaret J. (Alguire) Cassidy. Mr. Cassidy attended Chisholm, Minnesota public schools, Bemidji (Minnesota) State University, the University of Missouri, and the University of Chicago.
For the most part, his work life was given to editing business magazines and directing public relations programs for charitable organizations. He began his career in 1950 as assistant to the director of public relations at the national headquarters office of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks in New York City.
In Duluth, Minnesota, he was a writer-producer of television commercials and as an editor of business magazines. In New York City, he free-lanced as a public relations agent, numbering among his clients several national and international non-profit organizations.
In New York City in 1965, he and his wife, Abby Brown, formed Cassidy-Brown Public Relations, Inc. The company was later known as Public Relations Services, Inc. It specialized in placing authors, peace activists for the peace movement and later, religious and secular organizations on television and radio talk-show interview programs. There, the clients had an opportunity to present their organization's views of current issues.
Mr. Cassidy left the firm when he and his wife were divorced in 1980. His final work years were as a manager of an engineering library at the Federal Aviation Administration's Regional Headquarters in Burlington, MA
Prior to his death, Mr. Cassidy had donated his body to Harvard University's School of Medicine. There, it will serve for two years as a laboratory specimen for anatomy students. Its remains will be buried in a common grave in Essex County Cemetery, Massachusetts. Mr. Cassidy's daughter said that he was an atheist. There will be no burial or memorial services.
Mr. Cassidy is survived by his daughter and son-in-law, Constance and Alfred Samson-Cassidy, and by his former wife, Abigail (Seely Brown) Cassidy, all of Gloucester, MA. He is also survived by close friends John Watson Moses of New York City, Claudia Hampton Daly of St. Paul, Minnesota; Patricia Daugherty of Duluth, Minnesota, Michael Ray Lilly of Lowell, MA and his caregiver for the last five years, Debbie Kesslak of Lowell, MA.