Jim and I grew up next door to each other and we were best friends in high school. We're still pretty good pals. You'll have to excuse me for having a lot to say about my old buddy. Jim and I are 1963 graduates of Leitchfield High School - go Bulldogs! There was such remorse after we left that shortly afterwards they closed the school and consolidated into Grayson County.Jim's dad owned Allen's Lake on US 62 between Leitchfield and Caneyville. Jim and fellow Rotarian Linda Thomas were both lifeguards there. One of the happiest summers of my life was when the electricity in the concession stand went out and all the Dream Sickles and Fudge Sickles kind of melted together. They were salvaged into a chest freezer on his back porch and we spent the rest of that summer prying them apart and eating them. We rode bikes, went fishing, camped, and crawled around caves. Jim's Dad was County Judge and mine was State Representative. Both Republicans and all the time politicking or trying to get one another to run for something. Later Jim actually did run for State Senate in a heavily Democratic district. Jim Bunning was running for his first state office at the same time. The rest of course is history.
Jim started out at Union College at Barbourville and was on their swim team for two years. I had started out at Western. We both ended up at UK sometime in the mid 1960's. Jim and I would likely still be there if Dr. Savant at the College of Agriculture hadn't on separate occasions looked over our collections of huge numbers of college hours and declared us graduates.
While at UK Jim met his wife Judy. They've been married 40 years this year. Jim sold shoes at Myers in downtown Lexington while he was there and started a shoe store in Leitchfield when he moved back home. In 1970 he had the opportunity to buy a little weekly paper called the Grayson County News from my cousin, C.B. Embry Sr. As managing editor and publisher the paper did well. By 1975 he merged his paper with Al Smith of Russellville who also owned some small community papers. Over time they began to buy other community papers. In 1985 Jim and Al had the opportunity to sell out to Park Communications and did so. Jim stayed on as managing editor of the Leitchfield paper until 1990. During 1988 to 1991 Jim earned his Masters in Communications from WKU.
Jim had been in the Army Reserves since 1969 and when he retired from the newspaper business he went full time Army in Public Affairs. He was stationed in Columbus, Ohio and St. Louis, Missouri before being transferred to the Pentagon. He ultimately became the Public Affairs Officer for the Secretary of the Army and the Chief of Staff of the Army. He was there on 9/11. Jim spent his last year and a half teaching at the Army War College in Carlisle, PA before retiring to Bowling Green in 2005.
Jim and Judy have 12 acres on Old Greenhill Road in Alvaton and own a horse and a springer spaniel. They have three sons ages 39, 37, and 35 and 5 grandchildren. Jim teaches a night class fall semesters in speech at WKU. Currently he is rebuilding a 1984 Jeep Scrambler and he enjoys woodworking. He's made some very impressive looking cornhold game sets. I think Jim just likes to stay busy.
