Few can really remember it now, but long before the GOP reigned supreme in Cobb or Gwinnett counties, Fulton and DeKalb counties were its center points.
Back then it took courage to be a Republican. But Tom Lowe and his wife Bettye, who is a former Georgia House of Representatives member, never lacked that courage. He was also an astute businessman who founded Lowe Engineers Inc.
Georgia lost him last Thursday at the age of 86. Those who truly appreciate the Republican emergence from being a party with no presence to one of statewide dominance know the importance of his passing. With some 40 years as a Fulton County Commissioner, the early years of which being a Republican in Georgia was a “dirty word,” Tom and Bettye together fought for what was right and new. .
He and his wife helped forge a GOP that was neither pompous nor imperious. They were pioneers who fought for what they believed in– even in the face of powerful political forces who opposed them.
Tom Lowe is not forgotten but instead venerated as a man who always said what he believed. He was one of the first true Republicans in a county where such political “animals” did not exist. All of our love and condolences go to his family and friends.
