Minister to Strip, UNLV Starkes dies
The Rev. M. Thomas "Tommy" Starkes, whose diverse flock included employees of Strip hotels and casinos, cowboys hitting town for the National Finals Rodeo and athletes at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, died Saturday.
Starkes, 67, reportedly died of a heart attack while jogging.
Starkes was "a total character," said Steve Stallworth, who came to know Starkes during the minister’s tenure as chaplain of UNLV’s football team.
Starkes served as chaplain of both UNLV’s football and baseball teams. To players, he was known as "Bro T," said Stallworth, UNLV quarterback from 1982 to 1986 and now vice president and general manager of the Orleans Arena.
"He had it on his license plate, literally. It was like a ’66 Camaro or something, some old muscle car with a ‘Bro T’ license plate."
Starkes led pre- and post-game devotions for the team and helped start a Fellowship of Christian Athletes chapter at UNLV, Stallworth said.
He also "traveled with us to every away game," Stallworth recalled. "And I don’t think I’m exaggerating, but he never missed a practice."
Starkes’ wry sense of humor, high-energy personality and unstuffy manner appealed to football players and anybody else who might not otherwise be interested in attending church.
"You’d go to church, and they’d play the music, and all that stuff and pray," Stallworth said. "Then Bro T would come up and say, ‘OK, now, get ready for the best 10-minute sermon in town,’ and everybody else would yell back, ‘Because it’s the only 10-minute sermon in town.’ "
Starkes arrived in Las Vegas in December 1984. The next year he became pastor of The Church on the Strip, now Tropicana Christian Fellowship. He became a fixture along the Strip by ministering to casino and hotel workers and entertainers.
Over the years, he served as chaplain at several hotels, including the Flamingo, Bally’s, the Tropicana, MGM Grand and Mandalay Bay.
"I came up to him one time and said, ‘Bro T, how do you go into these casinos? What’s your strategy?’ ” Stallworth said. "He said, ‘I go into the employees’ dining room and just sit there, and word gets around.’ "
When the National Finals Rodeo relocated to Las Vegas in 1985, Starkes became its chaplain, conducting services and Bible studies for participants.
"He loved people. He loved interacting with people," said the Rev. Harry Watson, director of missions for the Southern Nevada Baptist Association. "He never met somebody he couldn’t talk to.
"He valued people, and he did not look at somebody and judge where they were at. He looked at somebody and saw they were doing the best they can in life, and he just helped them be better."
Starkes was born Oct. 8, 1939, in Eastland, Texas. He received a bachelor’s degree from Wayland College, now Wayland Baptist University, in Plainview, Texas; a master’s degree from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky.; and a doctorate from the University of Iowa. He also did postdoctoral work at the University of Wisconsin and Nigerian Baptist Seminary in Nigeria.
Starkes did missionary work in Panama in 1964 and in Nigeria during the late 1970s. Before moving to Las Vegas, Starkes served as director of the Southern Baptist Home Mission Board’s Interfaith Witness Department and was a professor at Southwest Missouri University and New Orleans Baptist Seminary.
Watson said Starkes had been slated to chair the local committee for evangelist Franklin Graham’s Harvest Crusade, which is scheduled to come to the Thomas & Mack Center in October 2008.
Survivors include Starkes’ wife of 22 years, Donna; a brother, Jerry Starkes of Lubbock, Texas; a daughter, Tamara Starkes, of San Francisco; two sons, Monte Starkes of Birmingham, Ala., and Jesse Starkes of Las Vegas; and four grandchildren.
Visitation will be from 4 to 7 p.m. today at Palm Mortuary, 7600 S. Eastern Ave. A memorial service is scheduled for 10 a.m. Friday at Cox Pavilion on the UNLV campus.
After interment, a reception will take place at Hope Baptist Church, 180 E. Pebble Road.
The family requests that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made to Safe Nest and the Women’s Resource Center.
