As a young Army lieutenant stationed in Germany, Bob McDonnell made the Guinness Book of World Records.
He organized his hospital unit to carry a 120-pound woman on a stretcher on a record-breaking trek — 93.4 miles in 32 hours.
Thirty-two years later, McDonnell, 55, is doing a different kind of heavy lifting, as he seeks to break the Democrats' eight-year hold on Virginia's governorship.
Since word surfaced seven weeks ago of his controversial graduate-school thesis, McDonnell has sought to focus the campaign on jobs creation in an economy battered by a deep recession.
That strategy appears to be working. Recent polls show McDonnell with enough of a lead over Democrat R. Creigh Deeds, a state senator from Bath County, that he is cautioning supporters against overconfidence.
"I've told my staff to forget the polls," McDonnell said recently. "We've got a hard-working opponent. We are opposed by President Obama and (Gov.) Tim Kaine, who have considerable resources. The only way we are going to win is to stay focused on our message and do an absolutely A-plus get-out-the-vote effort."
On the campaign trail, the former attorney general is cool and unflappable, traveling the state in a Ford Expedition. He also exhibits a keen sense of humor.
In February, during a dinner with reporters who cover state politics, McDonnell poked fun at one of his formative political alliances. He said he was so worried about the Democrats' media coverage and fundraising that he "called Pat Robertson and asked if he could direct a hurricane" to their Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner in Richmond.
McDonnell was born in Philadelphia but grew up in the Mount Vernon area of Fairfax County. He received an ROTC scholarship to the University of Notre Dame, where he earned a degree in management.
He spent 21 years in the Army, four and a half on active duty and the rest in the Army Reserve. He retired as a lieutenant colonel.
While in the reserve, he went to work for American Hospital Supply, managing operations in Atlanta, Chicago and Kansas City. By 1985, the hospital supply industry was hit by turmoil and McDonnell's GI Bill benefits were about to expire.
He and his wife, Maureen, returned to Virginia and made their home in Virginia Beach. They had come to like the area while he was stationed at Fort Eustis in Newport News. McDonnell also was attracted by Regent University, then called CBN University after founder Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network.
"I had gone to a Catholic school as a kid and to Notre Dame as an undergraduate," McDonnell said. "I liked the fact that Regent was focused on values and ethics, also that the public-policy area was focused on looking at the traditions and history that our Founders brought to the nation. I was particularly interested in the Judeo-Christian traditions of America."
McDonnell studied public policy and communications and then added a major in law the next year when the university opened a law school.
In 1989, McDonnell submitted his 93-page master's thesis, titled "The Republican Party's Vision for the Family: The Compelling Issue of the Decade."
Deeds has seized upon the document, terming it demeaning to working women. In campaign stops and television ads, the Democrat has hammered McDonnell, saying the thesis crystallized a brand of social conservatism that is out of touch with Virginia values.
In much of the thesis, McDonnell explored the tension between what he saw as a governmental interest in preserving the traditional family and the Republican tenet of limited government. He criticized the notion of additional tax credits for child care."Further expenditures would be used to subsidize a dynamic new trend of working women and feminists that is ultimately detrimental to the family by entrenching a status-quo of non-parental primary nurture of children," he wrote.
McDonnell says he has discarded the view, arguing now that the contributions of women are important to the workplace and politics. He says that as governor he would hire on merit and that he did so as attorney general, pointing out that half of the deputy attorneys general he appointed were women.
Out of law school in 1989, McDonnell was hired as an assistant prosecutor in Virginia Beach. There, he became interested in politics.
"I thought victims weren't treated very well and criminals were let off too easily," he said.
In 1991, McDonnell ran for the House of Delegates, knocking off Democrat Glenn B. McClanan, who had held the House of Delegates seat since 1972. He spent his first few years in the House introducing law-and-order bills and social legislation, including several anti-abortion bills. Rising swiftly through the ranks, he became chairman of the House Courts of Justice Committee and became a co-sponsor of then-Gov. George Allen's welfare-reform bill and a bill to abolish parole.
In 2005, McDonnell ran for attorney general, defeating Deeds by 360 votes in the closest statewide election in Virginia's history.
As attorney general, McDonnell cracked down on drunken drivers, drug dealers, identity theft and child sexual predators. McDonnell said the General Assembly passed 83 of the 94 legislative proposals made by his office.
He resigned in February to run for governor.
He organized his hospital unit to carry a 120-pound woman on a stretcher on a record-breaking trek — 93.4 miles in 32 hours.
Thirty-two years later, McDonnell, 55, is doing a different kind of heavy lifting, as he seeks to break the Democrats' eight-year hold on Virginia's governorship.
Since word surfaced seven weeks ago of his controversial graduate-school thesis, McDonnell has sought to focus the campaign on jobs creation in an economy battered by a deep recession.
That strategy appears to be working. Recent polls show McDonnell with enough of a lead over Democrat R. Creigh Deeds, a state senator from Bath County, that he is cautioning supporters against overconfidence.
"I've told my staff to forget the polls," McDonnell said recently. "We've got a hard-working opponent. We are opposed by President Obama and (Gov.) Tim Kaine, who have considerable resources. The only way we are going to win is to stay focused on our message and do an absolutely A-plus get-out-the-vote effort."
On the campaign trail, the former attorney general is cool and unflappable, traveling the state in a Ford Expedition. He also exhibits a keen sense of humor.
In February, during a dinner with reporters who cover state politics, McDonnell poked fun at one of his formative political alliances. He said he was so worried about the Democrats' media coverage and fundraising that he "called Pat Robertson and asked if he could direct a hurricane" to their Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner in Richmond.
McDonnell was born in Philadelphia but grew up in the Mount Vernon area of Fairfax County. He received an ROTC scholarship to the University of Notre Dame, where he earned a degree in management.
He spent 21 years in the Army, four and a half on active duty and the rest in the Army Reserve. He retired as a lieutenant colonel.
While in the reserve, he went to work for American Hospital Supply, managing operations in Atlanta, Chicago and Kansas City. By 1985, the hospital supply industry was hit by turmoil and McDonnell's GI Bill benefits were about to expire.
He and his wife, Maureen, returned to Virginia and made their home in Virginia Beach. They had come to like the area while he was stationed at Fort Eustis in Newport News. McDonnell also was attracted by Regent University, then called CBN University after founder Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network.
"I had gone to a Catholic school as a kid and to Notre Dame as an undergraduate," McDonnell said. "I liked the fact that Regent was focused on values and ethics, also that the public-policy area was focused on looking at the traditions and history that our Founders brought to the nation. I was particularly interested in the Judeo-Christian traditions of America."
McDonnell studied public policy and communications and then added a major in law the next year when the university opened a law school.
In 1989, McDonnell submitted his 93-page master's thesis, titled "The Republican Party's Vision for the Family: The Compelling Issue of the Decade."
Deeds has seized upon the document, terming it demeaning to working women. In campaign stops and television ads, the Democrat has hammered McDonnell, saying the thesis crystallized a brand of social conservatism that is out of touch with Virginia values.
In much of the thesis, McDonnell explored the tension between what he saw as a governmental interest in preserving the traditional family and the Republican tenet of limited government. He criticized the notion of additional tax credits for child care."Further expenditures would be used to subsidize a dynamic new trend of working women and feminists that is ultimately detrimental to the family by entrenching a status-quo of non-parental primary nurture of children," he wrote.
McDonnell says he has discarded the view, arguing now that the contributions of women are important to the workplace and politics. He says that as governor he would hire on merit and that he did so as attorney general, pointing out that half of the deputy attorneys general he appointed were women.
Out of law school in 1989, McDonnell was hired as an assistant prosecutor in Virginia Beach. There, he became interested in politics.
"I thought victims weren't treated very well and criminals were let off too easily," he said.
In 1991, McDonnell ran for the House of Delegates, knocking off Democrat Glenn B. McClanan, who had held the House of Delegates seat since 1972. He spent his first few years in the House introducing law-and-order bills and social legislation, including several anti-abortion bills. Rising swiftly through the ranks, he became chairman of the House Courts of Justice Committee and became a co-sponsor of then-Gov. George Allen's welfare-reform bill and a bill to abolish parole.
In 2005, McDonnell ran for attorney general, defeating Deeds by 360 votes in the closest statewide election in Virginia's history.
As attorney general, McDonnell cracked down on drunken drivers, drug dealers, identity theft and child sexual predators. McDonnell said the General Assembly passed 83 of the 94 legislative proposals made by his office.
He resigned in February to run for governor.
