Cows and Columns: Gene Simon's "Think about It," the Best of a New Mexico Ranching Journalist Through Twenty-Seven Years

For twenty-eight years, Gene Simon was publisher and CEO of four western Pennsylvania newspapers and a printing company. At age sixty-two he began a second career cattle ranching in southwestern New Mexico, a career now in its thirty-fourth year. Reluctant to give up journalism, he had a weekly column which ran for twenty-seven years, mostly under the title of "Think about It," published in eleven newspapers in three states. These columns, the best of which are compiled within, address a wide range of topics, from cattle ranching to the state of our democracy. As Paul Hess, retired Gannett executive editor, says, "He does not tell his readers what to think about a public issue, but rather he leads them with fierce conviction and powerful logic toward thinking about the issue for themselves."