Earl Snell

Earl Willcox Snell (born July 11, 1895 in Gilliam County , Oregon , †  October 28, 1947 in Lake County , Oregon) was an American politician and from 1943 to 1947 the 23rd  governor of the state of Oregon.

Early years and political advancement

After attending elementary school, Earl Snell studied at the Oregon Institute of Technology , but did not graduate from there. He then worked as a journalist and ran a successful car dealership between 1915 and 1945. Snell also took part in the First World War as a soldier. He later expanded his business activities to include livestock and banking.

Snell settled in Arlington early on. There the Republican became a member of the city council in 1926. Between 1927 and 1933 he served in the Oregon House of Representatives . Last year he was a speaker there . From 1935 to 1943 Snell Secretary of State ( Secretary of State ) of Oregon. In the gubernatorial elections of 1942 he was able to beat his party colleague, incumbent governor Charles A. Sprague . With the help of the Association of Automobile Sellers, he also succeeded in winning the actual gubernatorial election against the Democrat Lew Wallace.

Governor of Oregon

Snell took up his new office on January 11, 1943. During his tenure, he continued to expand the motorway network with the help of federal funds. He implemented the parts of the Federal Government's New Deal program that had not yet been introduced in Oregon . The end of the Second World War also fell during his term of office. This posed the same problems in Oregon as in the other states. The economy had to be cut back to meet civilian needs. The returning soldiers had to be reintegrated into society and the invalids and relatives of the fallen had to be cared for. So popular was Governor Snell in 1946 that he was easily elected to a second term by an overwhelming majority. He was also considered a possible candidate for a seat in the US Senate in an upcoming election.

But Snell could no longer realize these plans. After only nine months in his second term, he died, along with his Secretary of State Robert S. Farrell and Senate President Marshall E. Cornett, in a plane crash on October 28, 1947. The governor's two highest-ranking officials and constitutional successors to the governorship also died . Because of this, the President of the House of Representatives, John Hubert Hall , had to assume the office of governor.

Earl Snell was married to Edith Welshons, with whom he had a child.

Web links

• Earl Snell in nndb (English)
• Earl Snell at the National Governors Association (English)

• Earl Snell in the database of Find a Grave (English)