The rise, fall and rising again of U.S. Senator John Tower

Older readers of this newspaper will remember U.S. Senator John Tower, a man who at least almost came to national greatness.

Tower had been born in Houston and was a 1942 graduate of Beaumont High School. He was very well acquainted with Southeast Texas and East Texas because his father, Joe Tower, had been a Methodist minister, pastoring in several different cities in those areas while John Tower was growing up.

Early in my newspaper career, in the 1960s, I worked for the Wichita Falls Record-News and took some courses at Midwestern State University. Everyone at Midwestern was proud of the fact that the man who had become such a popular Republican senator had taught political science at Midwestern.

Tower served as a U.S. senator from Texas for almost 24 years, from 1961 to 1985. He had replaced Lyndon Johnson in the senate after Johnson became vice president under Kennedy.

During his first 10 years in the Senate, Tower gained in popularity not only in Texas but nationwide. He had served on several major boards and commissions which had dealt with significant issues of those days.

In 1971, speculation began to increase about the possibility that John Tower might run for president.

I was working for the Tyler Morning Telegraph at that time and pastoring a small church at Troup, just southeast of Tyler.

One afternoon, a reporter on the evening shift brought a stack of cardboard campaign posters into the newsroom. They were about three feet high and about four inches wide. In large letters printed vertically up and down the poster was the statement, “TURN TO TOWER.”

Tower was not really a towering man. He was actually shorter than most men, with a stocky build.

Due to speculation across the nation that Tower might be considering a bid to run for president, one political cartoonist drew a vertically deep cartoon showing five or six outhouses stacked neatly on top of each other. Underneath the cartoon was the two word caption: John Tower.

In 1971 I had invited an evangelist named Little George Havens to come and preach a revival at my little church in Troup. George, who had moved to Dallas, had gained some fame as a stunt man in Gene Autry westerns and in other movies.

He and his wife had come to our home for dinner on the first day of the revival.

Sitting in the living room, Havens said to me, “I hope John Tower will run for president.”

I replied, “I’m sorry, but I have interviewed him three times in the last year and he was drunk every time.”

Havens said sadly, “I am so sorry to hear that.”

Interestingly enough, Havens and his wife were back with us for another meal the following Saturday night.

While watching the 5 o’clock news, a segment came on about how Tower had reportedly been drinking excessively. Although married with three children, he was also accused of womanizing.

After watching that segment, Havens looked at me and said, “You knew it first.”

After that segment, there was little to no more talk about Tower running for President.

However, he did get re-elected twice more to the senate in the 1970s.

His wife, Lou Bullington whom he had met while a professor at Midwestern, stayed with him through his drinking and alleged womanizing until they divorced in 1975.

In 1977, I was working for the Lufkin Daily News. One afternoon, Sen. Tower walked into the newsroom smiling broadly as he was accompanied by a beautiful blonde woman who appeared to be a few years younger than he was.

Editor Joe Murray, City Editor Keith Allred and several of us reporters sort of gathered in chairs in a semi-circle with Tower and his friend and for several minutes we all just had a friendly chat.

His blonde friend told us she had helped Tower get his life straightened out. She said he had stopped drinking, now was totally committed to her and was focusing on his duties as a U.S. Senator.

I was so glad to hear that. I had had a tremendous admiration for Tower even during his drinking years and had agreed with most of his stands on the issues.

Tower retired from the Senate in 1985. In 1989 President H.W. Bush nominated Tower as Secretary of Defense, but the Senate rejected the nomination. Somehow they seemed unable to get past Tower’s former drinking and alleged womanizing.

About 14 years after Tower had visited the Lufkin Daily News newsroom, he and his middle daughter Marian and astronaut Sonny Carter were among those killed when an Atlantic Southeast Airlines plane crashed on approach for landing in Brunswick, Georgia. This was on April 5, 1991.

It’s sad how so many people, when they think of John Tower, only remember his drinking and womanizing. Instead, we should be remembering all of his great accomplishments which are far too numerous to begin to name in a column like this.

Tower and his daughter Marian are buried in the family plot at Sparkman-Hillcrest Cemetery in Dallas.