FAYETTEVILLE, NC (CelebrityAccess) — Anthony ‘Tony’ Rand, a longtime Democratic North Carolina State Senator and former concert promoter, died on Friday. He was 80.
According to an obituary published in the Charlotte Observer, Rand succumbed after a protected battle with thyroid and hypopharyngeal squamous cell cancer.
A native of North Carolina, Rand worked numerous jobs as a young man, including milk and newspaper delivery and serving as a car hop at Toot-N-Tell Restaurant in Garner, North Carolina.
After graduating Garner High School in 1957, Rand went to UNC-Chapel Hill, graduating in 1961 with a degree in Political Science
In the 1970s, Rand part of a promotional team that staged concerts throughout North Carolina, including the 1974 Peachtree Festival held at the Rockingham Motor Speedway, which drew tens of thousands of music fans with a lineup that included luminaries such as Fleetwood Mac and Three Dog Night.
According to the obituary, Rand was responsible for collecting ticket money and would ride a motorcycle from gate to gate. His law license came in handy later when Alice Cooper’s python somehow got loose in the hotel pool, the obituary said.
Rand joined the North Carolina State Senate in 1981 after he was appointed to a vacancy by Governor Jim Hunt and he won a narrow election to retain the seat the following term.
During his long tenure as a state legislator, he helped to bring a state lottery to fruitin and later served on the North Carolina Lottery Commission.
n 2009, Tony left the General Assembly and became Chair of the North Carolina Parole and Post-Release Supervision Commission, where he served until 2014 when he returned to Fayetteville and went into private practice.
Details on a future memorial service will be announced as the state of the world allows.
In lieu of flowers, his family asked that contributions be made to the University of North Carolina Geneva Yeargan Rand Distinguished Professorship Fund, UNC Law School, Campus Box 3380, Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27599-3380; The Fayetteville Technical Community College Foundation, 2201 Hull Road, Room 114, Fayetteville, North Carolina 28303; or the most effective effort to defeat Donald Trump in the 2020 Presidential Election.
