Tom Metzger, the former Fallbrook resident who oversaw white supremacist activities for decades, was cremated following his Nov. 4 death, Riverside County authorities reported Tuesday.
According to a death certificate for the notorious former KKK leader, he also suffered from atherosclerosis and anemia, which contributed to his passing in Hemet.
The certificate — listing the decedent’s race as “White” — was released Tuesday at Times of San Diego’s request.
Dr. James Alan Keating of Hemet certified that Thomas Linton Metzger died at 2:10 p.m. of Parkinson’s disease. Keating indicated he had cared for the San Jacinto resident since June 2017 and had last seen him alive on Aug. 27, 2020.
Metzger’s “place of final disposition” was listed as the residence of his partner, Mary C. Arnold, with the acronyms “CR/RES,” which means he was cremated followed by placement of cremains in one or more family residences.
It thus averts a grave that could be the site of celebration or protest.
Arnold had his power of attorney and reported Metzger’s death. Metzger’s wife, Kathy, died at Fallbrook Hospital of lung cancer in 1992. She was 49.
Funeral arrangements for Tom Metzger, 82, were handled by Inland Memorial Harford Chapel, according to the death certificate.
The certificate also listed Metzger’s stepfather and mother: Cloice Earl Metzger and Willowdean Marie Rickel, both of Indiana.
Metzger’s ancestry, upbringing and racist life were discussed in Elinor Langer’s 2003 book “A Hundred Little Hitlers,” which recounted the 1988 killing of Ethiopian student Mulugeta Seraw in Portland, Oregon.
On Sunday, Phyllis Kimber Wilcox added a footnote to Metzger’s story by recalling how he tried to join the NAACP in 1980.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People returned the $l0 membership fee paid by Metzger, then the grand dragon of the California Ku Klux Klan.
“Ben Solomon, the NAACP’s Southern California vice president, said … the civil rights organization … rejected the membership application of Klan leader Tom Metzger,” Wilcox wrote in blackvoicenews.com.
Solomon said the fee would be returned, but added the avowed racist “can do what he wants with the card.”
Wilcox concluded her essay: “There are those who say Metzger’s death closes a chapter in the ongoing story of America coming to grips with its racial history.
“Some people like things all wrapped up in neat little bows; it’s easier that way. If we’re honest with ourselves, we all know that real life isn’t like that. Metzger is gone and we are left to continue on the journey trailing this mortal coil along until we pass into the thing itself, the great mystery.”