Thomas Burns

Family to receive friends: Thursday, June 24 from 4:00-6:00 pm locally in Helena at Anderson Stevenson Wilke Funeral Home

Thomas M. Burns was born in El Dorado, Kansas on June 25, 1929, the oldest son in a family of two boys and one girl. All four of his grandparents immigrated to the United States from Ireland in the mid 1800s and all homesteaded in the Midwest.

He was very proud of his Irish heritage and grateful that he had several chances to return to the old country. Tom graduated from El Dorado High School (47) and then attended Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska. He obtained his law degree from the University of Kansas in 1958. He was commissioned a 1st Lt. in the Judge Advocate Generals Corps of the United States Army and served in Yangu, Korea with the 24th Infantry Division. As a lawyer, Burns practiced primarily oil and gas law in both Wichita, Kansas and in Denver, Colorado. He retired in 1984 as the senior and founding partner of the prominent firm of Burns, Wall, Smith and Mueller. He moved to Helena in 2007 to relocate near his daughter.

Tom and his ex-wife, Rosalin, were the proud parents of three children, Peggy (and husband Phil Deloria) of Ann Arbor, Michigan; Betsy (and husband Art Keeler) of Helena, Montana; and David, of Denver, Colorado. He frequently bragged about his kids and his two grandchildren Jackson and Lacey Deloria (Ann Arbor, MI). He was an excellent grandfather in every way and his grandchildren loved him ferociously. Tom enjoyed fishing, baseball, a good book, and the Thanksgiving holiday. He was a lively conversationalist, loved to tell stories, and nearly always had a smile on his face. Tom believed that the secret to a good life was to be hone'st and to always do your best. He instilled these beliefs in his children and grandchildren, and will be terribly missed by all of them. His passing on Fathers Day offers a fitting and appropriate tribute, as he was a committed dad who loved his children and grandchildren. Tom, like his father before him, stood out among all his fellows by virtue of his geniality and uprightness of his character.

Thomas M. Burns is survived by his children and grandchildren; his sister, Kathleen Kaine (Overland Park, Kansas) and brother, Jim Burns (Raytown, Missouri). At Tom's request, there will be a mass of Christian burial and internment in El Dorado, Kansas on July 23rd. There he will rest under the Kansas sunshine and the prairie grass of the farm country he loved so much.