Thomas Gee (24 January 181528 September 1898), was a Welsh Nonconformist preacher, journalist and publisher. Gee was born in Denbigh, Wales. At the age of fourteen he went into his father's printing office, Gwasg Gee, but continued to attend the grammar school in the afternoons. In 1837 he went to London to improve his knowledge of printing, and on his return to

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...

in the following year, he threw himself into literary, educational and religious work. Among his publications were the well-known quarterly magazine ''

Y Traethodydd ''Y Traethodydd'' (''The Essayist'') is a quarterly cultural magazine published in the Welsh language covering historical, literary and theological topics. It is the oldest magazine in Wales and the oldest magazine in the Welsh language still in ...

'' ("The Essayist"), '' Y Gwyddoniadur Cymreig'' ("Encyclopaedia Cambrensis"), and Dr. Silvan Evans; ''English-Welsh Dictionary'' (1868), but his greatest achievement in this field was the newspaper ''Baner Cymru'' ("The Banner of Wales"), founded in 1857 and amalgamated with '' Yr Amserau'' ("The Times") two years later as ''

Baner ac Amserau Cymru The ''Baner ac Amserau Cymru'' (established in 1857) was a weekly Welsh language newspaper, distributed throughout Wales and in the Liverpool area. It contained local and national news and information. It was formed by the amalgamation of ''Baner ...

''.

This paper soon became regarded as an oracle in Wales, and played a great part in promoting the

nationalist Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: Th ...

and

home rule Home rule is government of a colony, dependent country, or region by its own citizens. It is thus the power of a part (administrative division) of a state or an external dependent country to exercise such of the state's powers of governance wit ...

movement in the country. In educational matters he waged a long and successful struggle on behalf of undenominational schools and for the establishment of the intermediate school system. He was an enthusiastic advocate of church disestablishment, and had a historic newspaper duel with John Owen (afterwards

Bishop of St David's The Bishop of St Davids is the ordinary of the Church in Wales Diocese of St Davids. The succession of bishops stretches back to Saint David who in the 6th century established his seat in what is today the city of St Davids in Pembrokeshire, ...

) on this question. The

Eisteddfod In Welsh culture, an ''eisteddfod'' is an institution and festival with several ranked competitions, including in poetry and music. The term ''eisteddfod'', which is formed from the Welsh morphemes: , meaning 'sit', and , meaning 'be', means, ac ...

found in him a thorough friend and a wise counsellor. His commanding presence, mastery of diction, and resonant voice made him an effective platform speaker. He was ordained to the Calvinistic Methodist ministry, at Bala in 1847, and gave his time and talents ungrudgingly to Sunday school and temperance work. Throughout his life he believed in the itinerant unpaid ministry rather than in the settled pastorate. In 1886 he founded the Welsh Land League to campaign for the rights of tenants. Gee attended the founding meeting of the Welsh National Liberal Council in August 1898, and was elected as the organisation's president. He died in September, and his funeral was at the time the most imposing ever seen in northern Wales.

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