Thomas (Timothy) Steele Nichols, Jr. was found dead at his home on February 25th in Jamaica, Vermont.He was a resident of Annapolis, Maryland. Burial service to take place at the family plot at the Forest Home Cemetery in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Tim was born on May 11, 1942 in New York City. He attended the Buckley School before spending four years at the Phillips Exeter Academy. After spending a year in Italy working as a sports editor and photo reporter for the Rome Daily American and the United Press, he attended Yale University, receiving a B.A. in history in 1965. Subsequently he received an M.S. in counseling from Fordham in 1981.
Tim served his country as a member of the U.S. Air Force Reserve (1965-71), and was honorably discharged with the rank of Staff Sergeant.
Tim was a lifelong teacher of many disciplines, both in the classroom and on the athletic field. He was employed in a variety of roles at The Allen-Stevenson School in New York City from 1966 to 1978, serving as Director of Admissions, teacher at various levels of history, English, social studies, grammar, as well as tutoring in French and science, and as advisor to the Allen-Stevenson News and Unicorn yearbook (both Columbia Press Association award winners).
Tim both founded and coached the varsity lacrosse and hockey programs, as well as coaching varsity football and junior varsity baseball.
After leaving Allen-Stevenson, Tim became involved in many diverse ventures. As a talented and passionate lacrosse player from early childhood, he continued that commitment in the early 1980s as editor and publisher of the nascent Lacrosse Magazine, which he helped to become the success that it is today.
He returned to his coaching roots at the United States Naval Academy, leading the women’s club lacrosse team to become two-time U.S. Club Lacrosse champions. His players used Tim’s custom-strung sticks with special materials that far surpassed factory materials, and subsequently Tim developed a patented design for a stick head.
After his coaching career ended, Tim could always be found on the sidelines of high school lacrosse games throughout Baltimore County and the Atlantic Coast region.
Not to be limited to one simple avocation, Tim also pursued his lifelong passion for shooting, becoming the exclusive U.S. distributor for Farey wobble traps and a much sought after instructor and judge on the national and international sporting clays competitive circuit.
Tim even found time to get into the crab cake business for a period of time, distributing some of the Chesapeake Bay’s finest produce to discerning customers around the country, and to open a high-end Italian ceramics shop on Madison Avenue in New York.
Tim was always a great lover of opera and theatre, and was a current Board member of the Dorset Players in Vermont.
He was also a highly skilled photographer, flew his own helicopter, loved skiing, accurate weapons, fast cars, was a brilliant linguist who dreamed in Italian and was a world traveler with an insatiable curiosity about life and a matching capacity to absorb knowledge and impart it to those wise enough to listen.
He will be sorely missed by his many friends and family, who loved him dearly.