Theodore R. "Ted" Kulongoski is an American politician, who served as the 36th Governor of Oregon. A Democrat, he has served in both houses of the Oregon Legislative Assembly, as the state Insurance Commissioner, the Attorney General, and an Associate Justice on the Oregon Supreme Court. Kulongoski was born in St. Louis Missouri in 1940. He was 4 years old when his father died, and spent the rest of his childhood in a Catholic boys' home. After high school, Kulongoski served in the Marines. With the help of the G.I. Bill, he obtained an undergraduate and law degree from the University of... Missouri in 1970. Kulongoski then moved to Eugene, Oregon and became a labor lawyer. In 1974, Kulongoski was elected to the Oregon House of Representatives and, in 1978, to the Oregon State Senate. In Oregon's 1980 United States Senate election, he ran an unsuccessful race against Republican Bob Packwood. In 1982, he made his first bid for governor; he was defeated by Republican incumbent Victor G. Atiyeh. At the 1980 Democratic National Convention then-State Senator and U.S.
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