Jim Cochran, a Short Bio

Born in Pittsburgh, PA and third in a family of four children, Jim showed early promise in school as an artist. At age 14 he was sent to Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie-Mellon U.) in Pittsburgh for university level art classes. Jim left his studies upon the death of his mother in the early 60s and enlisted in the Marines.

Following a tour of duty in Vietnam and discharge, Jim worked at Pacific Gas & Electric in San Francisco, the El Paso City Planning Department, and private civil engineering firms drafting maps.

After returning to college, Jim turned professional in his art, working as a commercial artist, cartoonist and special assignment artist on newspapers and magazines. In the late 70s, he was nationally syndicated as a political cartoonist and was sponsored to the elite (200 member) American Association of Editorial Cartoonists. His work appeared in hundreds of newspapers around the US until he retired the feature in 1983.

One special assignment was as courtroom artist for Gannett Corp. (USA Today) in the Kenneth Bianci "Hillside Strangler" trial.

He discovered a talent for publishing and marketing, and began working to develop specialized publications. Among them are Cochran's Monthly and Cochran's Collector's Guide (with wife Bliss), and founded and sold the popular entertainment magazine Clubs & Pubs.

Jim now splits his time between co-publishing the annual Collector's Guide in summer in the small Mendocino coastal town of Gualala CA and cruising and racing his Morgan sloop "Bliss" in Mexico during the spring and winter months.

He paints in watercolor and oils, plays jazz in public (guitar, bass and keyboards) with vocalist & wife Bliss, roasts his own coffee, enjoys weightlifting and bicycling and is learning Spanish, music theory and patience.

The Boat Site

Paintings

Mexico