Today's Featured Biography

 
Jim Jensen

So much to remember! So little to account for! Born in Decorah and schooled there thru high school in 1953, then studied five years at Loras College in Dubuque, paying my way with wages from WDBQ Radio. After graduating in 1958, I spent a few months as a radio and TV personality in Cedar Rapids, awaiting military draft which caught me in April 1959. Two years of Army service at Fort Carson, Colo. and Fort Riley, Kan. was relieved greatly by marriage to Mary Ann Burds on April 30, 1960.

Returning to Cedar Rapids a year later, I took a job in the news department of the WMT Stations, covered the state legislature for them for six years, and wrote their editorials. In 1967, I joined the personal staff of Governor Harold E. Hughes, and after he was elected to the US Senate in 1968, we moved to Washington DC with him. I worked on the US Senate staff for 12 years, then moved to Illinois for a stint with the economic development agency. In 1984, we returned to Washington DC to a job as executive director of a national association of workforce development agencies. Six years later, I moved to the National Governors Association where I worked until I retired in 2003.

Now we live in an active adult community (55 and better) near Bull Run Battlefield Park and practice music, music, music. If you'd like a trained baritone to sing at a wedding or funeral, I work for expenses only.

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