The most unusual past professional lives in Congress

The U.S. Congress is a fairly homogenous place. Though it’s more diverse demographically than it ever has been, the vast majority of new members of Congress in 2015 came to Washington via traditional career pathways, rising through the ranks in politics or seeking office after a career in law or business.

But Congress also has its share of members who have taken more circuitous routes to national office, with a handful of politicians holding down an assortment of interesting jobs, from a Hall of Fame baseball pitcher to a rodeo announcer, a small vineyard manager and even a funeral parlor owner.

In 2014, the Congressional Research Service released its profile of Congress, which included a phenomenal section on members with less typical backgrounds. While some of the broader demographic trends will strengthen in 2015 — in the last Congress, for example, 20 senators were one-time congressional staffers, and this year the number swells to 22 — a number of the less typical members remain in office, too.

Among the most interesting: Republican Rick Crawford of Arkansas, who once was a rodeo announcer and later co-founded the Congressional Rodeo Caucus.

Their goal: “to establish an important voice for a storied American tradition while also recognizing the need for a group of members to work on issues pertaining to animal welfare,” according to Crawford’s congressional blog.

Democrat Mike Thompson of California was a small vineyard owner who started the Congressional Wine Caucus — a group that holds wine tastings on the Hill and is surprisingly not co-chaired by the informal congressional dean of wine consumption, Speaker John Boehner of Ohio.

Indeed, members who have had a unique career, talent or interest prior to joining Congress can probably find a caucus to match, such as the Carbonated and Non-alcoholic (C.A.N) Caucus, the Congressional Algae Caucus, the Congressional Baseball Caucus, the Congressional Caucus on CPAs and Accountants, and so on.

Others with unusual backgrounds or jobs include:

* Republican Steve Southerland of Florida owns a funeral home, a family business started by his parents in 1955.

* Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Penn., still owns the car dealership he bought from his father and expanded in the 1990s, before coming to Congress in 2011 (because who among voters doesn’t trust a car salesman?).

* Sen. Jon Tester of Montana, now tasked with leading the Senate Democrats’ campaign arm, has taken a turn running a family farm as well as a butcher shop — and famously hauls his meat for dinner from Montana to Washington.

Meanwhile, with the retirement of Heath Shuler of North Carolina, Congress is not only losing one of its few remaining Blue Dog Democrats, but also its final professional football player. Perhaps 20-20 hindsight of Shuler’s Congressional career will be better than his reflection on his NFL days, which he recently mocked in a Dish Network commercial.

Athletes are a dwindling group in Congress generally: Jim Bunning, the former Republican senator from Kentucky and Congress’s first and only Hall of Fame major league baseball player, was forced out of Congress in 2010 when Mitch McConnell cut off his fundraising base. Bunning still gets to go to Cooperstown annually, however, for Hall of Fame induction, so he has that going for him, which is nice.

In the Senate, only Democrat Cory Booker of New Jersey — a career politician who played college football at Stanford — has a serious sports background, though Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada loves to allude to his amateur boxing career when throwing political punches.