January 6, 1914 - February 6, 1991

Born Muzyad Yakhoob in Dearborn, Michigan, and later known as Amos Jacobs, Danny Thomas was best known for his television portrayal of Danny Williams on Make Room For Daddy. He appeared in many films and television shows, and partnered with Sheldon Leonard and Aaron Spelling to create shows such as The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Andy Griffith Show, and The Mod Squad.
 
Danny Thomas also founded the St. Jude’s Children Research Hospital in Memphis in 1962 and raised $12 million annually to keep it operating.
 
Brother Thomas' initiation on March 15, 1984 in Gothic Lodge in Hamilton Square, New Jersey led to a brief withdrawal of recognition by the Grand Lodge of California from August 29, 1984 to October 19, 1984, since Thomas was a resident of California at the time,  This incident did not prevent him from going on to be an active Shriner and to publicly speak glowingly about Freemasonry.

On February 16, 2012, the United States Postal Service issued a tribute to the 100th birthday of the late entertainer Danny Thomas and the 50th anniversary of the hospital he founded, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee.

Brother Thomas was born in Deerfield, Michigan, and grew up in Toledo, Ohio. He received his three Masonic Degrees in Gothic Lodge in Hamilton Square, New Jersey, as a courtesy for his mother Lodge, Palisades Lodge, in Santa Monica, California.

As an entertainer, he was perhaps most known for starring in Make Room for Daddy, a popular television comedy that aired from 1953 to 1964.

Behind the jokes and anecdotes he told to sell-out crowds across the country, including many Masonic groups, he was a serious humanitarian. In 1962, he founded St. Jude's at the suggestion of his friend, Cardinal Samuel Stritch, of Chicago.

     Brother Thomas died in 1991 at the age of 79.