Thai Gia Tran

Thai Gia Tran was born on October 10, 1940 in Nam Định, Vietnam. He passed peacefully in New Orleans, LA, on January 9, 2021, surrounded by his family. After serving as the Chief Security Officer for South Vietnam, he fled Saigon to start a new life in America. He earned degrees from George Washington University and Tulane University and worked his way up to become the head of the Biomedical Engineering department at Touro Hospital. He was an important member of the Vietnamese community in New Orleans as editor-in-chief of the weekly newspaper, Saigon Nhỏ (The Little Saigon News), which he began circulating in 1994 and continued to publish for the ensuing 27 years. Additionally, he was the editor-in-chief of Cỏ Thơm Magazine for 20 years. He realized his lifelong dream of publishing his book, Văn Học Việt Nam, a comprehensive history of Vietnamese literature that attempted to undo communist regime erasure of important Vietnamese literary works. Thai Tran devoted his life to his writing, his family, and to giving back to other Vietnamese veterans who may have been left behind in the wreckage of war. He is predeceased by his parents, Tran Gia Phuc and Le Thi Soan. He is survived by his children, Quan Quoc Tran and his partner Frederic Amelote; Catherine Tran Fellows and her husband Harry Fellows; Rosaline Tran and her husband Andrew VanVoorhis; and Elizabeth Tran and her husband Josh-Wade Ferguson. He is survived by a former partner and the mother of his daughters, Kim Loan Ta. He is also survived by his eldest and only son's mother, Yen Mai Nguyen. He left behind three grandchildren: Isabella Fellows, Spike Fellows, and Juniper Fellows. And, he leaves behind close family friends Chau Tran, Steve Dinh, and their children.