Ernest Frederick "Fritz" Hollings (1 January 1922-6 April 2019) was Governor of South Carolina (D) from 20 January 1959 to 15 January 1963 (succeeding George Bell Timmerman Jr. and preceding Donald S. Russell) and a US Senator from 9 November 1966 to 3 January 2005 (succeeding Russell and preceding Jim DeMint).
Biography[]
Ernest Frederick Hollings was born in Charleston, South Carolina in 1922, and he graduated from The Citadel in 1942 and served as a US Army artillery officer in North Africa and Europe during World War II. After the war, he became a lawyer, a member of the State House, Lieutenant-Governor (1955-1959, interrupting George Bell Timmerman Jr.'s terms), Governor (1959-1963), and a US Senator (1966-2005). For 36 years, until 2003, he formed the Senate's longest duo of senators alongside fellow South Carolina senator Strom Thurmond; while the Republican Party became dominant in South Carolina during Hollings' tenure, he remained popular. He voted in favor of the Gulf War in 1991, and he voted against the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993. Hollings retired in 2005, and he died in 2019.