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Tom Meyer, longtime crafter of Tom’s Pots, gets a final raising of mugs (and other ceramics) after his death
- Mark Sabbatini
- Jun 30
- 7 min read
Memorial service, wake and First Friday celebration among sendoffs this week for Meyer, 83, whose hand-thrown pottery became a signature item in many Juneau homes and businesses
By Mark Sabbatini
Juneau Independent
Tom Meyer never made pottery growing up and neither did anyone in the family, according to his sister. But during a life shaped by a remarkable range of experiences and occupations, the innumerable Juneau kitchens with "Tom’s Pots" became his signature achievement.
Meyer died at his Juneau home on May 24 at the age of 83. This week his family and many in Juneau who knew him — and affectionately use words like "eccentric" and "curmudgeon" to describe him — are remembering the many ways he affected their lives over decades for reasons beyond his ceramic creations.
His enthusiasm for running events like the Klondike Road Relay, foods like cabbage and noodles (as a single dish), classic literature, cowboy music, and patronizing the Triangle Club bar are among the stories being shared.
"I’m mourning for my brother, but I'm also mourning for Juneau because the people here have been so kind and welcoming, and I can feel the love that you have for him, and the hole it's going to leave in your heart," Cathy Frei, his sister, said during a memorial service Sunday at the Juneau Yacht Club attended by scores of people. "Juneau is the best place in the world that my brother found, and he found his people, his tribe, and the place he belonged."
Meyer, born in New Jersey in 1942 and raised on the East Coast, would work his way west after graduating college until he arrived in Alaska during the early 1970s. He earned a bachelor’s degree in forestry and a PhD in economics, and when he got to Juneau he worked economic-related government jobs until departing in the early 1980s to start his home-based pottery business.
"He was a PhD in economics and he gave that all away to be a potter," said Kim Metcalfe, one of several members of her family to speak at the memorial, noting he was a guest of theirs on occasions such as Thanksgiving. "But he used to talk about the government schmucks and he had no use for them."
His mugs, bowls and other pottery — all with his distinct signature on their undersides — were collected by homes and businesses, and featured at communitywide events such as the Alaska Folk Festival. His still-active website notes his coffee cups and steins "are decorated with artwork representative of Alaska" while "bowls and tankards are embellished with relief impressions of Alaskan animals, Native totemics and sea life."
The seriousness Meyer took his craft was described by Josh Anderson, who said about a decade ago he and his daughter Sarah, then age 5, offered to do artwork for some cups, featuring separate designs of blueberries and a whale. The word "cantankerous" was invoked to describe the negotiations.
"We negotiated terms, which was approximately 500 bucks to do this artwork, which to me was nothing and to Tom was everything," Anderson said. He said hundreds of hours of work occurred during a back-and-forth exchange between them "and I think we made 25 cents an hour."
"Then about a year or so ago we purchased the Triangle bar and I got to know Tom every single day, and reluctantly reminded him that I was the guy with the whale and the blueberries," Anderson said. "But it went well — he barely remembered — and then he proceeded to tell me all of the same stories that he’d already told me over and over."
The Triangle Club — where a wake was held Sunday evening after the memorial service — was indeed Meyer’s regular hangout. Many of the people at the memorial service recalled their encounters with him as employees or patrons, sometimes going back decades.
"I had the pleasure of being tortured by him, but I loved it," said Jewels Barmoy, noting she met him on her first day of work at the bar about 40 years ago. "It was a good torture and our friendship after that even got stronger when I retired from the Triangle, and he was having a little problem getting around and didn't have a car anymore. The truck that he was borrowing every summer finally broke in half, I think."
"So I was being his driver and taking him shopping, and helping him with deliveries, and just the amazing conversations that we would have for two or three hours riding in a car and going all around was fascinating. The fact that he could just remember the lineage of all of your family just as we were sitting there, and he was talking about people that I had no clue…He just did remember everything, and it was wonderful and I really thoroughly enjoyed that."
A story about the culinary aspect of his persona was shared by Ann Metcalfe.
"My recollection about Tom, besides him running out of bars to his wife, was the parties he would throw at his house," she said. "He was really a good cook and he would lay out one of his casseroles. You know, the eggplant parmesan — that's one of his mom's recipes, I didn't know that — and the polenta, and the red wine, and maybe a salad — it was usually a root vegetable or something, he wasn’t big on salads."
"But he always had that turntable, and my theory on Tom is that really his alter ego was that he wanted to be a cowboy because he would have Gene Autry and Roy Rogers and Hank Williams. I did a playlist — we’ll put on later — playing on the turntable to the point where it was sort of annoying, and then he'd stop and he'd go ‘Isn't this beautiful?’"
Food was also invoked by Meyer’s sister at the onset of her description of a high-energy childhood.
"His nickname was ‘Mater’ because he was always eating tomatoes," Frei said. More specifically, "he took a lunchbox to school — and you know that's what we had to eat, that was it — and it opened up and the tomatoes poured out, so they all started calling him ‘Mater.’"
Frei said her brother suffered other mishaps growing up, including wearing an eye patch for months after an injury, getting a tooth knocked out and — most seriously — breaking his neck as a lifeguard by diving into a pool without knowing some of the water had been drained from it.
"He had a big halo up here drilled in his head and these little braces — he was fine," she said, describing his appearance after getting medical treatment. "That's when we knew he was a favorite. My mother didn't drive, but she went every day by bus to see him in the hospital."
Meyer earned his forestry degree at Paul Smith’s College in Brighton, New York, and then his master’s and PhD in economics in Logan, Utah, according to an obituary provided by his family.
"He later moved to Seattle where he lived on a houseboat under the Aurora Bridge and drove a bus," the obituary notes. "He worked as a choker setter on the Olympic Peninsula and, in the early 1970s pre-pipeline days, Tom followed many people ‘North to Alaska,’ settling in what became his adopted home of Juneau."
Among those who got to know him during those early days was Kathleen “Teeney” Metcalfe, who told those at the memorial service she moved into a bedroom apartment at his house during the 1970s. She said that friendship endured and several years ago she helped look after him when he was taken to a hospital in Palmer.
"In the end, every day for about three months, I got a package from Tom Meyer that was filled with bowls and plates, so he was paying me back," she said. "And then he started calling me about once a week, once a month, whatever, but just to talk about Juneau."
Shari Teeple, who said she was known as Shari Gross when she first met Meyer in 1983, said her first impression of him was "a funny guy and eccentric, and obviously one of a kind." She said he also used to read literature daily to an elderly woman next door she described as "kind of cranky."
"I just wanted to tell that story because ‘curmudgeon’ does not include a loving heart at all," Teeple said. Also, she noted her birthday was close to his in June and "since 1983 or 1984, every June I've gotten a book for my birthday from Tom."
"He was wonderful and I'm really missing my birthday books this year," she said.
Stories that prompted laughs from people at the memorial were frequent, including one where a recording of a voicemail from a call he made on April 8, 2023, was played by Nellie Metcalfe.
"Nellie, this is your old friend Tom Meyer and it's one o'clock on Saturday," he told her. "I'm on my way out of the house. Sometime I would like you, if you're willing and able, to come over and set me up with a Venmo account. If it's a pain in the neck, and again, just let me know, right?"
A video recording of a KTOO episode of "Rain Country" from 1993 that features Meyer is on the "Taku For Two" YouTube channel. An addendum was shared at the site following his death.
"Thankfully his legacy will live on, not just through his prolific body of work, but through the stories and memories he also helped shape and paint in our community," the message states.
Another event commemorating his life is scheduled from 4:30 to 7:30 p.m. Friday at Annie Kaill’s, although a post at the gallery and gift shop noted the First Friday event was not originally planned as such.
"Having been planning this show with Tom before his passing, we made the decision to move forward with it," the store notes. "His life, his work and the ceramic legacy he leaves behind deserve to be honored and celebrated. We are honored to have worked with Tom for over 14 years and been friends with him well beyond that. Our hearts are heavy, but they are full."
• Contact Mark Sabbatini at editor@juneauindependent.com or (907) 957-2306.
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