Coke R. Stevenson
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Coke Robert Stevenson (March 20, 1888–June 28, 1975) was a U.S. political figure. He served as the Governor of Texas from 1941 to 1947.
He was the son of Robert Milton and Virginia Hurley Stevenson, who named him after Thomas Coke, a Methodist bishop. As a teenager he went into the business of hauling freight. In 1913 Coke Stevenson became President of the First National Bank in Junction, Texas. He served as Kimble County Attorney from 1914 to 1918, and Kimble County Judge from 1919 until 1921. In 1928 he was elected to the Texas House of Representatives and served there from 1929 until 1939, when he was elected Lieutenant Governor.
Stevenson succeeded to the governorship on August 4, 1941, when Governor W. Lee "Pappy" O'Daniel resigned to take his seat in the U.S. Senate, which he won in a special election. A 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. But Stevenson was reelected in 1942 and 1944 by substantial margins, and 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 in the state.
He ran for the Senate in 1948, and was defeated in a furious and controversial Democratic Party primary run-off by Congressman Lyndon B. Johnson. The disputed final margin of victory for Johnson was 87 votes, the closest senatorial vote in the nation's history. After the loss Stevenson became disenchanted with the Democratic Party, supported Republicans for the rest of his life, retired to Junction, and died in 1975.
Stevenson was a major figure in the second volume of Robert Caro's biography of Lyndon Johnson, covering the disputed 1948 election for the senate. Some observers have expressed Caro's characterization of Stevenson, believing him to be portrayed in an overly heroic manner, as a contrast to Johnson.
| Preceded by: W. Lee O'Daniel | Governor of Texas 1941-1947 | Succeeded by: Beauford H. Jester External links
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