Texas Governors

Question 1

Who was the first governor of Texas?

Answer 1

James Pinckney Henderson, a Democrat, who served from February 19, 1846 until December 21, 1847

Question 2

When was Ma Ferguson governor?

Answer 2

January 20, 1925 – January 17, 1927 (29th)
January 17, 1933 – January 15, 1935 (32nd)

Miriam Amanda Wallace “Ma” Ferguson (June 13, 1875 – June 25, 1961) was the first female Governor of Texas in 1925. She held office until 1927, later winning another term in 1932 and serving until 1935.

Question 3

When was Pa Ferguson governor?

Answer 3

January 19, 1915 – August 25, 1917
26th

James Edward Ferguson Jr. (August 31, 1871 – September 21, 1944), known as Pa Ferguson, was an American Democratic politician and the 26th Governor of Texas, in office from 1915 to 1917. Later, he was the first gentleman of Texas for two nonconsecutive terms.

Question 4

When was Ann Richards governor?

Answer 4

January 15, 1991 till January 17, 1995
45th Governor of Texas
She beat Clayton Williams 49-47 with Libertarian Party candidate Jeff Daiell drawing 3.3 percent.

Question 5

When was Allan Shivers governor?

Answer 5

Allan Shivers served as the 37th governor from July 11, 1949 to January 15, 1957.

He was a Texas politician who led the conservative faction of the Texas Democratic Party during the turbulent 1940s and 1950s. Shivers also developed the lieutenant governor’s post into an extremely powerful perch in state government.

Question 6

When was John Connally governor?

Answer 6

The 39th governor, he served from January 15th, 1963, to January 21, 1969. He removed the US dollar from the gold standard as Treasury Secretary in 1971 and became a Republican in 1973.

Question 7

When was Mark White governor?

Answer 7

Mark White, a Democrat, served as the 43rd Governor of Texas from January 18, 1983 to January 20, 1987. He attended Baylor undergrad and law school.

Question 8

Who was the second Governor of Texas?

Answer 8

George Tyler Wood

December 21, 1847 – December 21, 1849

The 1847 decision of Governor James Pinckney Henderson to not seek another term left a wide open race for his replacement. A race dominated by five candidates developed with the key issue being how to deal with the public debt.[2] About a month before the election one of the candidates, Isaac Van Zandt, died of yellow fever. Most of Van Zandt’s support shifted to Wood. As a result he won the election with 7,154 votes compared to second place finisher James B. Miller with 5,106.

He made unsuccessful runs to be elected Governor in 1853 and 1855. He died at his home on September 3, 1858

Question 9

Who was Texas third governor?

Answer 9

Peter Hansborough Bell
Democrat
March 4, 1853 – March 3, 1857

Question 10

Who was the governor in 1970?

Answer 10

Preston Smith, who succeeded John Connally. Succeeded by Dolph Briscoe.

40th
Democrat

January 21, 1969 – January 16, 1973

Lubbock airport named after him

Question 11

Who was governor in 1900?

Answer 11

Joseph Draper Sayers

22nd Governor of Texas
In office Jan 17, 1899 – Jan 20, 1903

Question 12

When was Dan Moody governor?

Answer 12

Succeeded Ma Ferguson
January 17, 1927 – January 20, 1931
30th

Elected at 33, youngest

Democrat

From Taylor

Opposed New Deal

Question 13

When was Pease governor?

Answer 13

June 8, 1867 – September 30, 1869
December 21, 1853 – December 21, 1857

5th and 13th

A native of Enfield, Connecticut, Pease moved to Mexican Texas in 1835. He soon became active in the Texas independence movement and after the Texas Revolution began, Pease became the secretary of the provisional government and co-wrote the new Texas Constitution. After independence had been won, Pease was named the comptroller of public accounts in the government of the new but temporary Republic of Texas.

As governor, he paid off the state debt and established the financial foundation that the state would later use to finance its schools and colleges.

During the American Civil War, Pease sided with the Union. After the war, he became a leader in the state Republican Party and was appointed as the civilian governor of Texas in 1867 by General Philip H. Sheridan who was the military head of the Reconstruction government. Pease’s policies as governor alienated both ex-Unionists and ex-Confederates and he resigned in 1869.

Question 14

Who is the 48th governor?

Answer 14

Greg Abbott
Republican
January 20, 2015

Question 15

Who was the 6th governor?

Answer 15

Hardin Richard Runnels

December 21, 1857 – December 21, 1859

notably was the only person to ever defeat Sam Houston in a political contest.

Question 16

When was Sam Houston governor?

Answer 16

December 31, 1859[1] – March 28, 1861

7th

The only American to be elected governor of two states (as opposed to territories or indirect selection), Houston was also the only governor within a future Confederate state to oppose secession (which led to the outbreak of the American Civil War) and to refuse an oath of allegiance to the Confederacy, a decision that led to his removal from office by the Texas secession convention.

Also 1st and 3rd Pres of Republic of Texas

Question 17

Who was 8th?

Answer 17

Edward Clark

March 18, 1861 – November 7, 1861

When Sam Houston refused to take an oath of allegiance to the Confederacy, Clark became governor.[2]

After losing the governor’s race by 124 votes to Francis Lubbock, Clark joined the 14th Texas Infantry as a colonel and was later promoted to brigadier general after being wounded in battle. He fled briefly to Mexico at the end of the American Civil War, and returned home to Marshall, Texas.

Question 18

Who was 9th?

Answer 18

Francis Lubbock
November 7, 1861 – November 5, 1863

He was the brother of Thomas Saltus Lubbock, for whom Lubbock County, Texas and the City of Lubbock are named.

Question 19

Who was 10th?

Answer 19

Pendleton Murrah

November 5, 1863 – June 17, 1865

died in Mexico where he fled

Question 20

11th?

Answer 20

Andrew Jackson Hamilton
In office
June 17, 1865 – August 9, 1866

In 1850 he was elected to the Texas House of Representatives representing Travis County as a Democrat. He would only serve one term, leaving office in 1853. During this time he joined the “Opposition Clique”, a faction of southern politicians in the Democratic Party who opposed secession and the reopening of the slave trade.

uring the American Civil War, Hamilton sided with the Union. After fleeing to Mexico, he went on a tour of the Northeast, giving speeches in New York, Boston, and other northern cities. He spoke out in favor of the Union and criticized the “slave power” of the South. Because of this Hamilton was regarded as a hero by the North, though he was generally viewed as a traitor at home.

In late 1862 President Abraham Lincoln named Hamilton the Military Governor of Texas with the rank of brigadier general of volunteers. He spent the rest of the war holding this empty position in New Orleans, after a Union attempt to capture South Texas failed in 1863.

On June 17, 1865, President Andrew Johnson named Hamilton as the provisional civilian governor of the state.[3] Hamilton held office for 14 months during the early stages of Reconstruction. He was governor when the nation ratified the Thirteenth Amendment and granted economic freedom to the newly freed slaves, although Texas itself declined to ratify the amendment until 1870. Hamilton also faced problems such as Indian incursions, general lawlessness, and chaotic finances in the aftermath of the Civil War.[4] When his plans at the Constitutional Convention of 1866 were not enacted, he rejected Johnson’s plan for Reconstruction and aligned himself with the Radical Republicans. He spoke out in favor of black suffrage and in September 1866 organized the Southern Loyalists’ Convention in Philadelphia, where he criticized President Johnson. He resigned in 1867 and went to work as a bankruptcy judge in New Orleans. Later that year he accepted a position as a justice on the Texas Supreme Court. Hamilton tried to regain the governorship in the election of 1869, but was defeated by Edmund J. Davis.

Question 21

James W. Throckmorton?

Answer 21

March 4, 1883 – March 3, 1887

12th

Throckmorton won the gubernatorial election of June 25, 1866, at the same time the new constitution was approved, against Elisha M. Pease. During his term in the governor’s office, Throckmorton’s lenient attitude toward former Confederates and his attitude toward civil rights conflicted with the Reconstruction politics of the Radical Republicans in Congress. He angered the local military commander, Major General Charles Griffin, who persuaded his superior, Philip H. Sheridan, to remove Throckmorton from office and replace him with an appointed Republican and Unionist, Elisha M. Pease.

Question 22

14th?

Answer 22

Edmund Jackson Davis

January 8, 1870 – January 15, 1874
Lieutenant Vacant

After Pease

In early 1861, Edmund Davis supported Governor Sam Houston in their mutual stand against secession. Davis also urged Robert E. Lee not to violate his oath of allegiance to the United States. Davis ran to become a delegate to the Secession Convention but was defeated. He thereafter refused to take an oath of allegiance to the Confederate States of America[2] and was removed from his judgeship. He fled from Texas and took refuge in Union-occupied New Orleans, Louisiana. He next sailed to Washington, D.C., where President Abraham Lincoln issued him a colonel’s commission with the authority to recruit the 1st Texas Cavalry Regiment (Union).

Question 23

15th?

Answer 23

Richard Coke

January 15, 1874 – December 21, 1876

4 children, all died before 30

No one benefited more from prevailing public sentiment than Richard Coke, who in 1873 leveraged resentment at Union occupation to construct a Democratic electoral coalition that ruled Texas for more than 100 years. This Democratic power was based on disfranchisement of blacks, Mexican Americans and poor whites through the use of poll taxes and white primaries. For example, the number of black voters decreased sharply from more than 100,000 in the 1890s to 5,000 in 1906.

“Instrumental” in A&M

Once the new Constitution had been negotiated, Coke resigned his office in December 1876 following his election by the legislature to the United States Senate. He would be reelected to federal office in 1882 and 1888, serving in the 45th - 53rd Congresses until March 4, 1895.[1] Coke was not a candidate for reelection in 1894.

Question 24

16th?

Answer 24

Richard Bennett Hubbard, Jr.

December 21, 1876 – January 21, 1879

Hubbard’s gubernatorial term was marked by post-Reconstruction financial difficulties, by general lawlessness, and by the fact that the legislature was never in session during his administration. Though political opponents prevented his nomination for a second term, he remained popular with the people of Texas. His accomplishments as governor include reducing the public debt, fighting land fraud, promoting educational reforms, and restoring public control of the state prison system

Question 25

Who preceded Ann Richards?

Answer 25

Bill Clements
In office
January 20, 1987 – January 15, 1991
42nd and 44th

In office
January 16, 1979 – January 18, 1983

Question 26

When was Dolph Briscoe governor?

Answer 26

January 16, 1973 – January 16, 1979

41st

Question 27

38th?

Answer 27

Price Daniel

January 15, 1957 – January 15, 1963

Question 28

36th?

Answer 28

Beauford H. Jester

January 21, 1947 – July 11, 1949

when he died of a heart attack aboard a train. He is the only Texas governor ever to have died in office.

As governor Jester created the Board of Texas State Hospitals and Special Schools, the Texas Youth Development Council, and reformed the state prison system. He also increased funding for state hospitals and orphanages, enacted strong right-to-work laws, and supported an anti-lynching law.[1]

Jester was easily re-elected to a second term in 1948. He then helped implement the most extensive education reforms the state of the time through the 1949 Gilmer-Aiken Act, the first comprehensive system for Texas school funding.

Namesake of Jester dorm

Question 29

35th?

Answer 29

Coke Stephenson
August 4, 1941 – January 21, 1947

As a teenager, he went into the business of hauling freight with a six-horse wagon. While hauling freight he studied bookkeeping by the light of his nighttime campfires as part of a plan to begin a business or banking career. Offered a position as a janitor for the Junction State Bank, he accepted and sold his freight hauling business. He was soon promoted to bookkeeper, and he became the bank’s cashier when he was twenty.

Stevenson studied law at night in the office of attorney and judge Marvin Ellis Blackburn while working at the bank, and attained admission to the bar in 1913.

In 1913, Stevenson organized and became president of the First National Bank in Junction, the seat of Kimble County. He also became active in several other business ventures, including a warehouse, movie theater, hardware store, automobile dealership, newspaper, drug store, and hotel. He was Kimble County Attorney from 1914 to 1918 and Kimble County Judge, the county’s chief administrative and executive position, from 1919 to 1921

Stevenson succeeded to the governorship on August 4, 1941, when O’Daniel resigned to take a seat in the U.S. Senate, which he won in a special election. In dramatic contrast to the flamboyant and unpredictable O’Daniel, Stevenson’s approach was so conservative and taciturn that his critics accused him of doing nothing. Stevenson was elected to a full term in 1942, winning the Democratic primary with 69% of the vote and being unopposed in the general election. He was elected to a second term in 1944, effectively unopposed.[4] When he left the governorship in January 1947, he was the longest-serving governor in the history of Texas and had presided over a broad and deep economic recovery during the years of World War II.

Huge political battles w LBJ, Caro book version

Question 30

34th?

Answer 30

W. Lee O’Daniel

August 4, 1941 – January 3, 1949

O Brother type radio show for his flour co
Best LBJ

Question 31

33rd?

Answer 31

January 15, 1935 – January 17, 1939

James Allred

loyal to FDR

Question 32

31st?

Answer 32

Ross S. Sterling
January 20, 1931 – January 17, 1933

Humble oil

Question 33

28th?

Answer 33

Pat Morris Neff

January 18, 1921 – January 20, 1925

Question 34

27th?

Answer 34

William Hobby

August 25, 1917 – January 18, 1921

Question 35

25th

Answer 35

Oscar Colquitt

January 17, 1911 – January 19, 1915

Question 36

24th?

Answer 36

Thomas Campbell
January 15, 1907 – January 17, 1911

Campbell distrusted monopolistic big business and sympathized with trade unions. He shared many of the reformist political views of former Texas governor James Stephen Hogg. In 1897, Campbell resigned from the railroad and became active in Democratic Party politics. At Hogg’s urging, he decided to run for governor.

Campbell was elected governor in 1906. In his two terms in office, 1907-1911, Campbell initiated a number of reforms involving railroad regulation, equitable taxation, and lobbying restrictions. In 1907, he named the legendary Captain Bill McDonald of the Texas Rangers as the state revenue agent. During his two-year appointment, McDonald increased the state’s valuation by a nearly a billion dollars.[1] The most significant legislation centered on prison reform, as Campbell’s administration ended the contract lease system for inmates and implemented more humane treatment of prisoners. Under Campbell, many state agencies also came into being, including the Department of Insurance and Banking, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the State Board of Health, and the Texas State Library.

Question 37

23rd?

Answer 37

Samuel Willis Tucker Lanham
January 20, 1903 – January 15, 1907
He was the last Confederate veteran to serve as governor of Texas.

Question 38

21st?

Answer 38

Charles Allen Culberson
January 15, 1895 – January 17, 1899

Culberson’s political career began with his election as Attorney General of Texas in 1890, a position he held until 1895, after campaigning for and winning the governor’s race in November 1894. After two terms as governor, he was elected to the U.S. Senate as a Democrat on January 25, 1899. Early during his tenure, he served on the Lodge Committee investigating war crimes in the Philippine-American War. Later, he chaired several senate committees, including the judiciary committee, which he chaired from 1913 – 1919.

Culberson was reelected in 1905, 1911, and, again, by popular vote in 1916, when health problems and alcoholism prevented him from campaigning in Texas but did not prevent his reelection. However, his health and opposition to the Ku Klux Klan finally led to the loss of his seat in the Democratic primary in 1922.[1]He was succeeded by fellow Democrat Earle Bradford Mayfield, the outgoing member of the Texas Railroad Commission. Mayfield won a two-to-one general election victory over the Independent write-in candidate, George Peddy, a former state representative from Shelby County.[2]

Culberson lived in retirement until his death from pneumonia in Washington, D.C. on March 19, 1925. He is buried in East Oakwood Cemetery in Fort Worth, Texas.

Culberson was a distant cousin of current U.S. Representative John Culberson, who represents Texas’ 7th congressional district.

Question 39

Hogg?

Answer 39

20th
January 13, 1891 – January 15, 1895
First born in Texas

Question 40

19th?

Answer 40

Lawrence Sullivan Ross

January 18, 1887 – January 20, 1891

Question 41

17th?

Answer 41

Oran Milo Roberts

January 21, 1879 – January 16, 1883

Question 42

18th?

Answer 42

John Ireland

January 16, 1883 – January 20, 1887

Question 43

46th?

Answer 43

George W. Bush

January 17, 1995 – December 21, 2000

Question 44

Rick Perry?

Answer 44

December 21, 2000 – January 20, 2015

47th