Thomas Sancton, Sr.

Thomas Sancton (born January 11, 1915) is an American novelist. He was born in the Panama Canal Zone and raised and has lived most of his life in New Orleans, Louisiana. His books, such as "By Starlight", and "Count Roller Skates" are often set in his native Louisiana. He studied at Harvard as Niemann Fellow in the early 1940s. He wrote extensively on civil rights and the South while managing editor of The New Republic and, later, as Washington editor of The Nation. In the 1950s he was a reporter and feature writer for The New Orleans Item (afternoon newspaper) and taught feature writing at Tulane University where he had graduated in 1935. In the 1960s he represented clients of Walker Saussy Inc., a public relations firm. In earlier years he had reported for Life magazine and the Associated Press.

He is the father of Thomas A. "Tommy" Sancton, noted jazz clarinetist and former Paris bureau chief for Time magazine.