Thaddeus Stanley Golas (1924–1997)

Thaddeus Stanley Golas was born on June 15th, 1924 in Paterson, New Jersey. He was the youngest of five children. Both his parents were of Polish descent and met in the United States. Thaddeus enlisted into the army in 1942 and became part of the 604th Engineer Camouflage Battalion at Camp Campbell in Kentucky. He shipped off to England, then France, where he served until 1944, briefly saw combat at the Battle of the Bulge. He returned to the United States and attended New York's Columbia University where he studied under such illustrious professors as Jacques Barzun, and earned a B.A. Degree (Class of '48). He first worked as a proofreader for Betty Ballantine, and later became an editor for Redbook Magazine and later worked at Harper & Row as a book representative. He held several publishing related jobs in the Midwest, and finally moved to San Francisco, experimented with LSD, and self published his book, The Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment. He married 3 times. Thaddeus Golas wrote The Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment in a language that any reader of English could hope to understand; the simplicity of the book was clearly behind its success. The little “Guide” has a simple thesis: “Enlightenment doesn’t care how you get there.”