Ex-legislator Brandon dies at 73 after stroke
Posted on Tuesday, May 23, 2006
URL: http://www.nwanews.com/adg/News/155502/
Former Arkansas legislator Jim Brandon died Friday at a Washington, D. C. hospital of complications from a stroke.
He was 73.
Brandon, the son of a locomotive engineer and a post office worker, was born in Poplar Bluff, Mo. He attended Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., briefly before transferring to the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, where he served as president of the Kappa Sigma fraternity.
Longtime friend Philip Anderson, a Little Rock attorney, first became acquainted with Brandon at the university.
“I met him my freshman year and we remained friends,” Anderson said. “Jim was very well known on campus and was involved in campus politics and student publications. He started a monthly magazine called the Razorblade. Its slogan was ‘Arkansas’ sharpest magazine. ’”
Brandon’s 1957 marriage to Phyllis Dillaha, whom he met at UA, ended in divorce in 1980. Phyllis Dillaha Brandon is editor of the High Profile section of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
In 1960, at the age of 28, Brandon, a Democrat, was elected a state representative, narrowly defeating the incumbent, prominent Little Rock socialite Willie Oates. Brandon served two consecutive terms as representative before being elected to the state Senate in 1964, where he served one term.
“Jim was a very good legislator and he had a good record,” Anderson said. “He loved his work. He lived and breathed politics.”
Brandon campaigned unsuccessfully for Pulaski County judge in 1976 and 1978.
Brandon was a delegate to two state constitutional conventions and attended four Democratic national conventions. He served eight years on the Democratic State Committee.
In 1962, Brandon formed Brandon Agency, an advertising and public relations firm at Little Rock.
“Politics was his passion,” said one of his sons, Philip Brandon of Little Rock. “Even his advertising agency mostly dealt with advertising and consulting for political campaigns.”
In one instance, that led to trouble.
In 1974 it was revealed that the agency had served as a conduit from 1968 until 1972 for illegal corporate contributions from Arkansas milk producers to political candidates. Brandon was never directly implicated in any violation of the federal campaign law, but acknowledged in a 1976 Arkansas Democrat interview that the matter had been embarrassing. He said in the same interview that he did not know that the contributions were illegal.
Brandon moved to Washington D. C. in the early 1980 s to work as a professional fundraiser for nonprofit organizations.
“He really didn’t do a lot of work in politics after he moved to Washington,” his son Philip said. “He would come and visit often. He was proud of his sons and grandkids.”
In addition to his career, Brandon served as president of a neighborhood advisory commission in Washington, D. C.