D. Bruce Shine collection

D. Bruce Shine was born on August 11, 1938. He received his B. S. Degree from Tusculum College in Greeneville, Tennessee, and his J. D. From Vanderbilt University School of Law in Nashville, Tennessee. Shine later pursued further legal training in the School of Graduate Legal Studies at Columbia University. Shine is a member of the Kingsport, Tennessee law firm of Shine & Mason (formerly Ferguson & Shine), and has for many years served as the General Counsel for the United Textile Workers of America. He has also represented many other labor unions in Tennessee and nationally.

During the 1960s, Shine held a variety of positions in the political and diplomatic arenas, including: State,Field Secretary, Page, and Legislative Aide to U. S. Senator Estes Kefauver (D-TN) from 1952 to 1963; Legislative Assistant to U. S. Senator Ross Bass (D-TN), 1966; Aide to Vice-President Hubert H. Humphrey, 1966-1968; Informational Staff, International Secretariat, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), 1963; and Official Observer, NATO Parliamentarian Conference, Paris, France, 1963.

Shine has also served in a variety of other civic and educational positions. He was a Special Associate Professor at East Tennessee State University in 1973; a commissioner of the Tennessee Arts Commission, 1967-1974, holding the posts of Vice Chairman and later Chairman; President, Board of Directors, Kingsport Girls Club; National Director, Girls Clubs of America; Director, Kingsport Symphony Association; Trustee, Tusculum College; and Commissioner, Kingsport Public Library Commission. Shine also was a member of the Tennessee American Revolution Bicentennial Commission, the Finance Committee of the Estes Kefauver Memorial Foundation, and an officer of St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Kingsport.

In 1970, Shine was the Democratic nominee for the U. S. Congress from Tennessee's First Congressional District in an unsuccessful bid for that seat. In 1972, he was elected.as Tennessee's Democratic National Committeeman, and in June of the same year was elected to serve out the unfinished term of State Senator Herbert S. Walters. Shine made another try at elective office in 1976 when he campaigned to be the Democratic candidate in the U. S. Senate race. He withdrew from that campaign prior to the Democratic primary, however,and Jim Sasser subsequently won the Democratic nomination. In November of 1976, Sasser defeated the Republican incumbent, Bill Brock.

Shine died in 2021.