Howard Elsworth Robert Thomas was born September 11, 1906 in Dryndale, PA, to Mr. & Mrs. John R. Thomas. He left school in the eighth grade to work in a coal mine. He later attended the Missionary Training Institute in Nyack, NY, then went to Stony Brook School (1928-1930) in Long Island, NY, before coming to Wheaton College in 1930. Thomas married Ruth Margaret Hatcher in 1933; the Thomases were the first Wheaton couple allowed to marry while still students. They graduated from Wheaton in 1934, both having majored in History. Thomas also received a Bachelor of Divinity degree from Mc Cormick Theological Seminary (1937), and Masters degree in Sociology (1942) and Doctoral degree in Sociology-Anthropology (1945) from Cornell University in Sociology with minors in Rural Education and Social Anthropology.

In 1937, Thomas and his wife went to Yunnan Province in the Golden Triangle along the Burmese border in southwestern China as missionaries with the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions. Thomas was appointed supervisor of the South China leper colonies along with Marie Park. Immediately following Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, the Thomases were interned by the Japanese in Thailand until mid-1942, after which they returned to the United States. They returned to Asia in 1946, where he served as field administrator for United Church Relief in South China and Northern Siam until 1947. After returning to the United States, Thomas taught at Cornell (1947-1962); conducted research on the educational status of migrant children; worked as a consultant to the U.S. Office of Education (1952) and with the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Mission to evaluate rural extension project in India and Pakistan (1955); and authored a number of studies. In 1962, Thomas was appointed Community Development Advisor to the Laos Mission with the U.S. Agency for International Development. The Thomases returned to the United States, working at Montreat College in Swannanoa, NC.

Thomas died in 1991.