Thomas Sutherland | Teacher, ex-hostage, 85

Thomas Sutherland, 85, a teacher who was held captive in Lebanon for more than six years, died Friday in Fort Collins, Colo., according to Colorado State University.

Mr. Sutherland was released in 1991 and returned home to become professor emeritus at the university.

He was one of a number of Americans in Lebanon - including Associated Press bureau chief Terry Anderson - who were kidnapped by terrorist groups in the 1980s. He was dean of the Faculty of Agriculture and Food Science at American University in Beirut when he was taken hostage by Islamic terrorists in 1985.

"I spent six years out of the seven years I was in captivity with Tommy," Anderson told the Associated Press on Saturday. "We were kept in the same cells and sometimes on the same chain. Whenever they moved us, generally Tommy would show up with me. He was a kind and gentle man."

In 1996, Mr. Sutherland and his wife, Jean, came out with a book about the Middle East and their ordeal titled At Your Own Risk: An American Chronicle of Crisis and Captivity in the Middle East.

The Sutherlands were community leaders and volunteers, CSU said. They formed the Sutherland Family Foundation, which has supported many Fort Collins nonprofits. - AP