Hey, I've completely abandoned the red vs blue dichotomy but the man did lead an interesting life and could probably whoop most of the denizens of this board at 70...
Harry Mason Reid Jr. was born on December 2, 1939, in
Searchlight, Nevada, the third of four sons of Harry Reid, a rock miner, and Inez Orena (Jaynes) Reid, a laundress for local brothels.
[2][3] At that time, Searchlight was a small, impoverished town.
[4][5] His father died of suicide in 1972, at the age of 58, when Harry was 32 years old.
[6][7] His paternal grandmother was an English immigrant from
Darlaston,
Staffordshire. Reid's boyhood home was a shack with no indoor toilet, hot water or telephone.
[6][8]
Since Searchlight had no high school, Reid boarded with relatives 40 miles (64 km) away, in
Henderson, so that he could attend
Basic High School,
[6] where he played
football and was an
amateur boxer.
[9] While at Basic High, he met future Nevada governor
Mike O'Callaghan, who was a teacher there and served as Reid's boxing coach. Reid attended
Southern Utah University and graduated from
Utah State University in 1961, where he double-majored in political science and history.
[10] He also minored in economics at Utah State's
School of Commerce and Business Administration.
[11] He then attended
George Washington University Law School while working as a police officer for the
United States Capitol Police, and he earned his
Juris Doctor in 1964.
[4]