Sheila Thomas

Writer, producer, and consultant Sheila Gregory Thomas was born on November 11, 1938 in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Her mother was Hugh Ella Hancock-Gregory and her father was Thomas Montgomery Gregory, a well-known educator and dramatist. Thomas graduated from Howard University with her B.A. degree in Spanish in 1961. Upon graduation, she was hired as a Spanish teacher in the Washington D.C. public school system, where she taught until 1969. She then created, produced, and hosted the educational children’s television program The Magic Door on WMAL-TV in Washington D.C, which aired from 1969 until 1973. In 1974, while working as an independent writer and consultant, she became media coordinator for the vice chairman of the D.C. city council. She has published articles relating to her family’s history, and in 1984, she wrote an article about her great-grandmother entitled “Margaret Mahammitt of Maryland,” which was published by the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History. Thomas also authored an article in 2002 about her father, Thomas Montgomery Gregory. In 2008, three family biographies she wrote for the African American National Biography project were published by Oxford University Press. Thomas has received the MAMM Award from the American Association of University Women, the Action for Children’s Television Award, the Capital Press Club Award, and the Ohio State Award.