Tom Pyle

Praise My Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for HIS Mercy and Grace so bountifully shown to me and mine he has so wonderfully blessed me with during my lifetime here in this earth suit!!! No, I do not think I can ever retire with Christmas, Thanksgiving, Birthdays, Anniversaries, Graduations, Visits, and all those ballgames, matches, dramas, debates, etc. We have been to Africa 3 times in the last 2 years and my mother Alice will be 95 in a few weeks.

After MHS Graduation I had scholarship offers KU football, basketball Iowa U, U of New Mexico, U of Colorado, U of Florida, & Iowa State University which I accepted to pursue my architectural career originally a 5 year program which was changed to 6 years. Did not feel right about taking a marriage deferment from the draft even though I had Jill & Tommy at the time, so one day as I entered the courtyard door of our ISU apartment I had to jump and dodge Martha's swinging of my ballpeen hammer at both of my knee caps. As I wrestled her down laughing and saying you'll ruin my basketball playing, Martha yelled, "basketball smashketball, you got your draft notice and I'm going to smash your kneecaps!!!" Needless to say I had to think fast and I said, "I can join Iowa Military Academy (IMA), a 2 year program, and surely the Vietnam War would be over by then." That seemed to calm her down and save my basketball playing. IMA was known as little West Point West since we received all the old West Point uniforms and swords. Our cadre, DI's & Officers, were free back on rotation from Nam and their goal was to break us if they could as was evidenced by my roommate. I graduated from ISU and was able to transfer from my Iowa unit to the McPherson unit who had just come back from Vietnam. My Iowa unit was called up a month or 2 after my transfer. You can look at my web site www.pyledesignbuild.com & if patient see some 85 of my thousands of projects. Now you can understand my comments section. My best friend and wife, Martha went home with the Lord on June 29, 1982 and our youngest, Susanna, was just 2 years. I was very fortunate to marry Becky Koehn on February 5, 1983, and at least I was happy until early April, 1985. I was unable to convince her of the value of our marriage and my love for her, and in Kansas if the judge tells you, Mr. Pyle, you have no say in saving you marriage, I couldn't. I still love Becky as a sister-in-Christ, but no longer as a wife. Needless to say this was my worst failure as a husband and father and as a man to date. Sometime latter I met and feel in love with a young lady from Kenya. The story of how our paths crossed is quite unusual and may share at some future time. She is a very intelligent woman, except for the fact of marrying me. We have my 7th son, James and my 7th daughter Joy and a small army of relatives in Africa. Nina's father has glaucoma and is a retired medical doctor and her mother is retired from head nurse of the Kisumu Hospital but has private clinics in the a small town & in the home village. Also, I have been made an Elder in the tribe and have inherited several widows in their 80's who claim me as husband. So you see I cannot stop working. I helped set up several companies in Kenya but own none personally. One has well drilling equipment that constantly needs repairing and has provided many water wells. Another has completed several construction projects including 2 pedestrian bridges (one flooded out), the remodeling of a power plant on Lake Victory, and several remodels. Another was low bidder on replacing 10,000 street lights in Nairobi with solar powered LED lights this past summer. Another, is contracting the installation of irrigation systems. To keep me sane and some may question that, I still maintain a course to my long term goal of designing and building the great temple in Jerusalem. Years ago when still a young teen the dream was planted, later dreams placed in my heart the design, and then I built a model of it when there was no material strong enough and thin enough to accomplish it. Then a few years back the strengths were verified as being achievable and now the timing is to wait. If the Lord wants me to do, I shall do it. If HE does not, it has been a JOY to DREAM! God bless you all and may you know the Peace of Christ !!!