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James Allen Hightower  Jim
was born January 13, 1943 in Denison, Grayson County, Texas. While
attending college, he worked as assistant general manager of the Denton
Chamber of Commerce and, later, became a management trainee for the
State Department. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in
government from the University of North Texas, Denton, Texas where he
served as student body president. His graduate work was at
Columbia University, New York City, NY in international affairs.
HIS CAREER In the late 1960s, Jim worked in Washington D. C. as legislative aide to U.S. Senator Ralph Yarborough. He managed the presidential campaign of former Senator Fred R. Harris of Oklahoma in 1976. He returned to Texas to become the editor of The Texas Observer. His first attempt at public office was an unsuccessful bid for the Democratic nomination for Texas Railroad Commissioner. Hightower was elected Agricultural Commissioner in 1982, unseating fellow Democrat Reagan V. Brown. He was unseated in 1990 by the Democrat-turned-Repulican Rick Perry. During his tenure as AGricultural Commissioner, he is noted for fostering organic production, alternative crops, direct marketing to small farmers, strong gross materials regulations. He became a leading national spokesman for the Democrats and endorsed Jesse Jackson for president in 1988. Three of Hightower's aides; Mike Moeller, Pete McRae, Billie Quicksall, were indicted and convicted of bribery charges related to Jim's fund raising activities. The activities involved shaking down seed dealers under the departments oversight to make contributions to Hightower's re-election campaign. Hightower was not involved in the plot, however it contributed to his defeat by Rick Perry. In the 1992 presidential election, Jim supported the U.S. Senator candidate Tom Harkin from Iowa. Harkin left the race. Jim supported, then, Jerry Brown, governor of California. He cast his superdelegate vote for Governor Bill Clinton at the 1992 Democratic National Convention. In 2000, he joined talk show host Phil Donahue and actress Susan Sarandon to co-chair the presidential campaign of Ralph Nader. Since 1993, Jim has produced "Hightower Radio", a daily two-minute commentary carried by 130 affiliates. His broadcasting career also included a weekend talk show on ABC radio network and a weekday midday talk show on the United Broadcasting Network.. HIghtower, currently, writes a nationally syndicated column carried by seventy-five weekly newspapers. He also writes a monthly newsletter "The Hightower Lowdown" which has more than 125,000 subscribers. He also writes for "The Progressive Populist." "Doug Jones Average" The
"Doug Jones Average," a concept created by Jim Hightower, is the
proposal that in order to check the true health of the American
economy, it is less useful to look at the Dow Jones Industrial Average
than it is to check up on how Doug Jones down the street is doing. If
Doug Jones is on welfare, cannot feed his family, is blowing his
savings, and is three weeks behind on his bills, the Doug Jones average
is "down." If Doug just got a raise, can pay his bills and Doug and his
family are looking into owning a nice but not too expensive house, the
Doug Jones average is "up AWARDS AND HONORS 2009 Puffin/Nation Prize for Creative Citizenship  Biography Index Susan Hawkins © 2024 If you find any of Grayson County TXGenWeb links inoperable, please send me a message. |