Martin J. McGowan, Jr.

Martin J. McGowan, Jr. (October 28, 1920 – August 13, 2009) was an American politician and newspaper editor.

Born in Appleton, Minnesota, McGowan graduated from Appleton High School in 1938, attended the University of Notre Dame from 1938–40, and then received his bachelor's degree from the University of Missouri School of Journalism in 1942. Due to the labor shortage during Word War II and despite the fact of having a job offer from one of the wire services in Chicago, McGowan went back to Appleton after college to help his father publish the Appleton Press during the war as McGowan, his father, Martin McGowan, Sr., and one office girl put out the paper for the remainder of the war. The grueling effort to put out the Press during the war took its toll on his father's health and McGowan then became the editor and publisher of the Appleton Press, as well as five other weekly newspapers in Minnesota and Wisconsin later in his career. McGowan served as chair of the Minnesota Ethical Practices Board, the board of the Minnesota Press Club, as secretary of the Minnesota 7th Congressional District DFL, the Blue Earth County, Minnesota Planning Board and the Appleton, Minnesota Library Board. From 1959 until 1967, McGowan served in the Minnesota House of Representatives as a Democrat and was an assistant majority leader of the House in his last two terms. McGowan came from a very active political family: His father, who published the Appleton Press from 1914 to 1947, was the campaign manager for the Democratic candidate for governor of Minnesota in 1920, a presidential elector for President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1940, was in charge of political patronage in the west-central area of Minnesota during the Roosevelt administration, and was a close personal friend of Minnesota Gov. Elmer Benson, also a native of Appleton.. McGowan, Jr.'s nephew, Rick Nolan, also served in the Minnesota House of Representatives and later served five terms in the U.S Congress as a Democrat and is at present still serving in that role. A cousin, Nora Slawik, also served five terms in the Minnesota House of Representatives and is currently the mayor of Maplewood, Minnesota. McGowan also worked for Minnesota Public Television for five years as a lobbyist and grant writer, and moderated his own show on KTCA-TV in St. Paul entitled "Seminar for Seniors." McGowan married the former Betty Nolan of Brainerd, Minnesota on July 3, 1943 and to that union nine children, seven boys and two girls, were born. McGowan died at Abbot-Northwestern in Minneapolis, Minnesota on Aug.13, 2009, two months shy of his 89th birthday.