For the 19th-century baseball player, see Tom Sexton (baseball)

Tom Sexton (baseball)

Thomas William Sexton was a Major League Baseball player. He played twelve games for the Milwaukee Brewers of the Union Association in 1884. He played from 1883-1887 in the Northwestern League.-Sources:...

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Tom Sexton (born 1940) is an Alaskan poet and scholar who became the state's Poet Laureate

Poet Laureate

A poet laureate is a poet officially appointed by a government and is often expected to compose poems for state occasions and other government events...

 in 1995

Childhood and education

Sexton grew up in Lowell, Massachusetts

Lowell, Massachusetts

Lowell is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, USA. According to the 2010 census, the city's population was 106,519. It is the fourth largest city in the state. Lowell and Cambridge are the county seats of Middlesex County...

. After graduating from Lowell High School

Lowell High School (Lowell, Massachusetts)

Lowell High School is a single-campus public high school located in downtown Lowell, Massachusetts. The school is a part of Lowell Public Schools...

 in 1958, he spent three years in the Army – two of them stationed in Alaska

Alaska

Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area. It is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait...

. He then worked odd jobs, before enrolling in Northern Essex Community College

Northern Essex Community College

Northern Essex Community College is a state-assisted, two-year college, located in Essex County in northeastern Massachusetts...

 in Haverhill, Massachusetts

Haverhill, Massachusetts

Haverhill is a city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 60,879 at the 2010 census.Located on the Merrimack River, it began as a farming community that would evolve into an important industrial center, beginning with sawmills and gristmills run by water power. In the...

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He went on to enter Salem State College

Salem State College

Salem State University is a four-year public institution of higher learning located in Salem, Massachusetts. Salem State University, established in 1854 as Salem Normal School, is located approximately fifteen miles north of Boston, Massachusetts. Salem State enrolls over 10,000 undergraduate and...

, graduating in 1968 with a bachelor’s degree in English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

. He then went to the University of Alaska

University of Alaska Fairbanks

The University of Alaska Fairbanks, located in Fairbanks, Alaska, USA, is the flagship campus of the University of Alaska System, and is abbreviated as Alaska or UAF....

, where he earned a Master of Fine Arts

Master of Fine Arts

A Master of Fine Arts is a graduate degree typically requiring 2–3 years of postgraduate study beyond the bachelor's degree , although the term of study will vary by country or by university. The MFA is usually awarded in visual arts, creative writing, filmmaking, dance, or theatre/performing arts...

 degree and was hired to help establish the English Department at the newly opened Anchorage Campus

University of Alaska Anchorage

The University of Alaska Anchorage is the largest school of the University of Alaska System, with about 16,500 students, about 14,000 of whom attend classes at Goose Lake, its main campus in Anchorage....

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Career

From 1970 to 1994, Sexton taught English and creative writing at the University of Alaska – Anchorage where he established the creative writing program and served as English Department chair for several years. He was a founding editor of the Alaska Quarterly Review, leaving the magazine when he retired in 1994. He was appointed Alaska's Poet Laureate in 1995, having been selected by the Alaska State Council on the Arts (AKSCA) and confirmed by the Alaskan legislature.

Sexton is the author of ten books of poetry. His A Clock With No Hands is a collection of poems about growing up in Lowell. His most recent book is For the Sake of the Light.