By James Perry

In last month’s article I brought you up into the 1950s through the Democratic Party and after General Dwight Eisenhower retired from the Army as supreme commander of all the Allied Forces during WWII. He changed from the Democratic Party, became a Republican and won the presidency in the 1952 election. As the first article published in the December issue stated during the 1930s and into the early 1970s, the Democratic party had some very fine conservative congressmen, senators and governors. Let’s take a look at some who were mostly southern.
We’ll start with a governor from the great state of Alabama. His name was George C. Wallace, a man born and raised from the tiny town of Clio, Alabama. George Wallace was short in stature, but big with brains and a large serving of common sense and political savvy. He won the Alabama Governor’s race on Nov. 6, ,1962, and assumed governorship on Jan. 14, 1963.
One of the first things George Wallace faced when becoming governor was that the previous governors had nearly bankrupted Alabama. The state faced a 2.2-million-dollar deficit when Wallace began his first term. The two former governors had bought two yachts. One, a 95 ft. seagoing vessel, bought by “Kissing” Big Jim Folsom. The second, an 80 ft. craft bought by Governor Gordon Persons. Folsom’s second term saw seven airplanes bought and used mostly to take Folsom, his family and friends to out-of-state Alabama football games. Governor Patterson, during his term, sold five of these airplanes and bought four more. The state filed a lawsuit against his brother Maurice whom he appointed State Finance Director for $950,000. One of Governor George C. Wallace’s first directives after assuming office was to sell all the airplanes and the two yachts and put the money back into the state treasury.

Governor Wallace was hammered by the state and national press as being a segregationist. But on assuming office, he started a program to build new black schools throughout Alabama. After his first term, blacks had better schools than whites. Governor Wallace initiated a road building program which, through his four times as governor, put Alabama in the forefront with the best roads in the south. His road improvement project paved almost all dirt roads which helped farmers immensely. Governor Wallace also started the Junior Colleges and trade school program in Alabama. He wanted every high school graduate to have the opportunity to get a college education or a trade school diploma.

One of the best schools by Governor Wallace was the Alabama Aviation Technological Institution at Ozark, Alabama. It has trained pilots who have gone on into flying for airlines and flight instructors for our military, and pilots for UPS and Fed-Ex and the corporate world.

Many young men have studied there, acquired their A&P and avionics license and got jobs with the major airlines as mechanics and avionics technicians, both high paying jobs. These courses take only 18 months for the A&P and 24 months for the avionics course.

Governor Wallace’s forward thinking and his fiscal conservative oversight moved Alabama from mostly dirt roads, and today the new Space Force is based at the Huntsville Space Center.

Another great Democrat conservative from Alabama entered Alabama politics as a congressman in 1937 and remained there until 1946 until he was elected to the Senate. He remained in the U.S. Senate until 1979. His name was John Sparkman. Senator Sparkman was a large supporter of the Redstone Arsenal which became the Huntsville Space Center and today has become home base for the new U.S. Space Force. As a U.S. Congressman, he helped set up the Social Security Administration, which benefits millions of retired American workers today. Congressman Sparkman was instrumental in setting up the TVA, which was originally headquartered at Muscle Shoals, Alabama and eventually moved to Knoxville, Tennessee. Just think of how the TVA has helped Alabama, Tennessee, and all states that border these two states. Senator Sparkman was involved in many more projects that have positively affected the south and all of America. He was another politician who was conservative and party affiliation didn’t matter to him. We need more like him today.

Here's some music to listen to. Listen to it on YouTube as you’ll not hear it on any local radio stations.
1. Earth Angel by The Penguins
2. The Angels Listened In by The Crests
3. Heaven on Earth by The Platters

See you next month with Part 3.