Tuesday's List: Florida's Governors and Senators in My Lifetime

I was born in 1956 and my family moved to Florida sometime in 1958...naturally, at the time I had no concept who "my" elected governor and senators were.  The first time I became aware of the Florida governor happened during the 1966 Democratic primary campaign, which was wide open between incumbent Haydon Burns, Scott Kelly, and Miami mayor Robert King High.  High defeated Burns in the runoff, but Burns wouldn't support High in the general election against Claude Kirk.  Although High was popular in South Florida with his "Integrity is the Issue" slogan, it didn't transfer statewide and he lost.  I remember the morning right after that election going to school at Nova Elementary and hearing some classmates with Republican parents whooping it up in victory...as if they had any idea what they were talking about.  With the U.S. Senate, my first memory was of Lawton Chiles' populist campaign against GOP candidate Bill Cramer...Lawton used the gimmick of walking across the state ("Walkin' Lawton") and captured the popular appeal.  Then, during the Senate Watergate hearings in 1973, the other Florida senator, Edward Gurney, was the only member of the panel who wholeheartedly defended Richard Nixon...

If you look at the governors list, you'll see two of them, Wayne Mixson and Buddy MacKay, who served very short stints.  Mixson took over from Bob Graham for the overlapping four days of the latter's conclusion of his governorship and the start of his newly-elected term in the U.S. Senate.  As for MacKay, although he lost the governor's race in 1998 to Jeb Bush, the sitting governor, Lawton Chiles, passed away that December and Mackay, then the lieutenant governor, succeeded him for the remaining weeks of his term...

With the senators lists, you'll notice the division into classes.  This is because only a third of the nation's Senate seats are up for election in any given even-numbered year and Florida has Classes 1 and 3: the Class 3 election, which Marco Rubio won, was held last year and Class 1, to which Bill Nelson belongs, stands up for election in 2018...

The following lists show the names in capitals, preceded by their years of service, and followed by party affiliation...

******GOVERNORS******

1955-61 LEROY COLLINS (D)
1961-65 C. FARRIS BRYANT (D)
1965-67 W. HAYDON BURNS (D)
1967-71 CLAUDE KIRK, JR. (R)
1971-79 REUBEN ASKEW (D)
1979-87 BOB GRAHAM (D)
1987      WAYNE MIXSON (D) [Jan. 3-6]
1987-91 BOB MARTINEZ (R)
1991-98 LAWTON CHILES (D)
1998-99 BUDDY MACKAY (D) [Dec. 12-Jan. 5]
1999-2007 JEB BUSH (R)
2007-11 CHARLIE CRIST (R)
2111-now RICK SCOTT (R)

******U.S. SENATORS*****

-----------CLASS 1-------------

1946-71 SPESSARD HOLLAND (D)
1971-89 LAWTON CHILES (D)
1989-2001 CONNIE MACK (R)
2001-now BILL NELSON (D)

-----------CLASS 3-------------

1951-69 GEORGE SMATHERS (D)
1969-74 EDWARD J. GURNEY (R)
1975-80 RICHARD STONE (D)
1981-87 PAULA HAWKINS (R)
1987-2005 BOB GRAHAM (D)
2005-09 MEL MARTINEZ (R)
2009-11 GEORGE LEMIEUX (R)
2011-now MARCO RUBIO (R)