A three-time college dropout, Jim Cash received a bachelor's in English from Michigan State University (MSU) in 1970, followed by an master's in Television and Radio in 1972. As a professor of writing and film history, in 1975 Cash met a student while working at MSU, Jack Epps, Jr., who would later become his writing partner. They began their writing relationship while outlining their first stories together on a napkin in the MSU Union Grill. Soon afterwards Epps moved to Hollywood, while Cash stayed grounded in their native Midwest but still collaborated across country and co-wrote many 1980's and 1990's international box office blockbusters including Top Gun (1986)_, The Secret of My Success (1987)_ and Turner and Hooch (1989)_ and Anaconda (1997)_. Cutting short his twenty-five year partnership with Epps, Cash died in 2000 of an intestinal ailment and was survived by his wife and four children.
Often wrote in collaboration with Jim Epps Jr.
Was a professor of English and American Thought and Language at Michigan State University.