Prescott S. Bush Jr., 87, the older brother of one president (George H.W. Bush) and uncle of another (George W. Bush), and a retired insurance executive who tried but never made it far in the family business -- politics -- died Wednesday in Hingham, Mass., after a long illness.
Bush was the son of a wealthy senator, Prescott S. Bush and spent much of his career as a businessman but dabbled in local politics in his home state, Connecticut, for many years, at one point serving as a Republican committee chairman in Greenwich.
And yet in many ways, Bush, who was born with the use of only one eye, lived in the shadow of his younger brother. He dropped out of Yale University in 1943 to move to South America, where he worked for Pan American Airways, before returning to work on Wall Street. Bush joined an insurance brokerage firm, Johnson & Higgins, in 1952, and later became a partner.
In 1982, with his brother serving as vice president under Ronald Reagan, Bush sought to take advantage of the family name and launched a Senate bid against Lowell P. Weicker, a Connecticut senator who had won nine elections in a row. Just five weeks before the Republican primary, Bush dropped out of the race after building accusations that he never really had any interest in public service.
NEW YORK TIMES
