For the businessman who oversaw the construction of the Twin Cities streetcar system, see Thomas Lowry

Thomas Lowry

Thomas Lowry was a lawyer, real-estate magnate, and businessman who oversaw much of the early growth the streetcar lines in the Twin Cities area of Minneapolis, St. Paul, and surrounding communities in Minnesota...

.

Thomas ("Tom") Coleman Lowry (17 February 1898 in Fern Hill, Hawke's Bay

Hawke's Bay

Hawke's Bay is a region of New Zealand. Hawke's Bay is recognised on the world stage for its award-winning wines. The regional council sits in both the cities of Napier and Hastings.-Geography:...

 – 20 July 1976 in Okawa, Hastings) was a New Zealand

New Zealand cricket team

The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...

 cricket

Cricket

Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...

er. He played in the first seven Test match

Test cricket

Test cricket is the longest form of the sport of cricket. Test matches are played between national representative teams with "Test status", as determined by the International Cricket Council , with four innings played between two teams of 11 players over a period of up to a maximum five days...

es that New Zealand ever played, captaining the team in all of them.

Lowry served in the Royal Flying Corps during the First World War, before going up to Cambridge University

University of Cambridge

The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...

 in 1921. Despite his clear cricketing skills, he struggled to make what was then an excellent first-class

First-class cricket

First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...

 side in his first two years, and did not earn his Blue. He did, however, play some games for Somerset

Somerset County Cricket Club

Somerset County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Somerset...

, although his qualification to do so was obscure. The story is told that his birthplace was said to be Wellington, without mentioning that it was not the Somerset market town but the one in New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

; in fact, this was how Somerset had skirted the regulations for Peter Randall Johnson

Peter Randall Johnson

Peter Randall Johnson, born at Wellington, New Zealand on 5 August 1880 and died at Sidmouth, Devon on 1 July 1959, was a cricketer who played for Cambridge University, Somerset and several amateur sides in a long first-class cricket career that stretched from 1900 to 1927. During his career, he...

 before World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

. In 1922 he toured with Archie MacLaren's side to Australia and New Zealand

New Zealand cricket team

The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...

 and in 1923 secured his place in the Cambridge University cricket team

Cambridge University Cricket Club

Cambridge University Cricket Club is a first-class cricket team. It now plays all but one of its first-class cricket matches as part of the Cambridge University Centre of Cricketing Excellence , which includes Anglia Ruskin University...

, scoring over 1,000 runs and playing for the Gentlemen. He was captain of Cambridge in 1924.

He then returned to New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

 and captained New Zealand's first Tests, against England in 1929–30, but toured England in 1927

New Zealand cricket team in England in 1927

The New Zealand cricket team toured England in the 1927 season. The team contained many of the players who would later play Test cricket for New Zealand, but the tour did not include any Test matches and the 1927 English cricket season was the last, apart from the Second World War years and the...

, and again in 1931

New Zealand cricket team in England in 1931

The New Zealand cricket team toured England in the 1931 season. The tour was the first tour by a New Zealand team in which Test matches were arranged. Originally, only one Test was planned, but New Zealand acquitted themselves so well in the first match and in the game against MCC that matches...

, the latter occasion including New Zealand's first overseas Tests. Later he became a cricket administrator: he was player-manager of the 1937

New Zealand cricket team in England in 1937

The New Zealand cricket team toured England in the 1937 season. The team was the third from New Zealand to tour England, following those of 1927 and 1931 and the second to play Test matches. Three Tests were arranged: England won the second match at Manchester, and the games at Lord's and The Oval...

 New Zealand tour to England, and became President of the New Zealand Cricket Council. As a result of his sister's marriage, he was brother-in-law to Percy Chapman

Percy Chapman

Arthur Percy Frank Chapman was an English cricketer who captained England to a then English-record-equalling seven consecutive Test match wins, a record that was not surpassed until Michael Vaughan's team won eight in a row in 2004...

.