Frank Gibson is the founding director of TCOG and served as its first executive director from 2003 to 2011. He then became public policy director for Tennessee Press Association. Gibson is a longtime journalist, working as a reporter and editor at The Tennessean. He was political editor for more than 12 years. Born and raised in Tennessee, Gibson graduated from University of Tennessee in Knoxville where he was editor-in-chief of the student-run campus newspaper, The Daily Beacon. He has been an active member of Society of Professional Journalists his entire career, serving as its national president in 1990. He retired from TPA in 2017.