KIWANIS MEMBER SPOTLIGHT

Tom Pozarycki grew up in Brooklyn, NY in the shadow of the Brooklyn Dodgers’ Ebbets Field, where he spent many summers attending Dodgers games and playing baseball. In high school he discovered math and science, competing on the mathematics team and engaging in science projects. Tom studied engineering at Michigan State, and upon graduation he enlisted in the US Navy and was commissioned at the Naval Officer Candidate School in Newport, RI.

Tom’s first volunteer assignment as a Naval Officer involved the clandestine recording of nuclear signatures of Russian warships and weapons in the Black Sea. He then spent one year aboard the USS Paul Revere off the coast of Vietnam as an engineering and weapons officer, after which he had the good fortune, as a young lieutenant, to become the acting director of the US Navy Art Collection.

After completing his active duty, Tom and his new wife, Eloise, moved back to Del Mar, CA, where Tom received an invitation from the Navy to join a special intelligence operations group which was being assembled with former US Navy officers. He accepted and spent the next five years in Germany working against the Soviet Naval threat. After the unit was dissolved, Tom continued his work as a commissioned US Foreign Service Officer working primarily in Western Europe during the heart of the Cold War. This included service as Science Officer at the US Embassy in Vienna, Austria, where he engaged with the International Atomic Energy Agency and other scientific bodies. While awaiting assignment to Buenos Aires, temporarily delayed because of the ongoing Falklands War, his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer, to which she succumbed after a nine year fight.

Tom continued his work against the Cold War Soviet military and scientific complex, culminating with his working directly for President Ronald Reagan. Passionate about bringing down the Soviet Union, Reagan brought the full resources of the United States toward that effort. As liaison from the President’s office, Tom successfully mustered those resources so that Reagan would later  demand in his speech at the Berlin wall: “Mr Gorbachev, take down this wall.” The Soviet Union collapsed shortly thereafter.

In two plus decades of retirement from the Federal Government, Tom has honed his entrepreneurial skills as a builder and amateur architect, has owned several sailboats and has sailed many of the world’s oceans, and has nurtured his love of art. He is blessed with four outstanding children, and nine perfect grandchildren, ages 4 to 18. Committed to the work of Kiwanis Carefree, he is
particularly pleased to help the young people of this community attain their goals and reach their full potential. Tom is a member of the Kiwanis Communications and Funds Request Committees, and Chairman of the Major Projects Committee. Please join us and come meet Tom.