Judith Thomas

1947 - 2025

Longtime Calistoga resident Judith Thomas died Sept. 17, 2025, in Napa. She was 78.

She was born Judith Frances Lee on March 3, 1947, in Richmond, Virginia, to Lawson Lee and Frances (Thomas ) Lee.

After her family moved to Arizona, Judith attended high school in Tucson, where she met her future husband, Ruben Armenta. Soon after Ruben was drafted during The Vietnam War, the couple married in New York City in June of 1966, then were stationed in Germany for two years.

The couple returned to Arizona and had two sons, Christopher and Justin, and the family lived in Ventura, Tempe, American Samoa, Fairfield, and Baltimore before moving to Calistoga in 1991.

Prior to moving to Calistoga, her home of 34 years, Judith earned a bachelor's degree from Arizona State University, where she took a fateful tennis class that proved to be the only course she did not receive an "A" in, Ruben recalled. While living in Baltimore, she worked at a Montessori school.

During her time in Calistoga, Judith worked at the Calistoga Bookstore and for literary agent Martha Casselman, but her true passion was writing and directing musicals for community theater productions in the Napa Valley, earning particularly high praise for her original musical Minnie Pearl's Opery.

As a teen she sang in the school choir and became an avid fan of the Beatles, seeing the British band perform live twice: Once in San Diego, and once at Shea Stadium in NYC, a concert that Ruben described as one of the "highlights of her life."

Judith is survived by her sister Deborah (David), brother Randy (Lori), former husband Ruben (Billie), sons Christopher (Justine) and Justin (Suzette), and granddaughters Meira (Chris) and Cierra (Seth), as well as nephews Timothy, Matthew, Jon and Joshua, and nieces Heather and Brittani. She was preceded in death by her sister Virginia.

No services are planned. Judith Thomas