Female Governors

A great way to blow time, in my opinion, is to learn tons of useless information by surfing around on Wikipedia. Today I was brushing up on my Female Governors of U.S. States when I discovered a remarkable fact. Although Missouri has never had a female governor, four (4) Missouri-born women have served as governor of other states. Take note of: Nellie Ross, the nation's first female governor (Wyoming, 1925-27); Jane Hull, who as the second of Arizona's three female governors (1997-2003) served at a time when the state's top five elected officers were women; Jeanne Shaheen (1997-2003), who was elected governor of New Hampshire three times; and Linda Lingle, Hawaii's current governor (since 2002), now in her second term as the state's first Jewish, first female, first childless, and first twice-divorced governor.

Yes, folks, they all came from Missouri. We supply the raw materials - other states make history.

And if you think the history of the U.S. presidency is wild and woolly, Wiki the governors of the several states sometime. There are some scorching-hot stories! Governors being assassinated (possibly by political opponents); governors committing suicide in office; multiple governors claiming to hold office in the same state at the same time; governors serving for unusually long and ridiculously short periods of time (six men served 16 years); two governors who were successfully recalled; and women governors Ma Ferguson of Texas and Lurleen Wallace of Alabama, who were little more than figureheads, holding office while their husbands governed. Mrs. Wallace, the only female U.S. governor who died in office, made the ultimate sacrifice to help her husband become the longest-serving governor in U.S. history. Gads, what a piece of work that man was! You want drama? Get into the dirty details of the the political history of our country and its states!

EDIT: Who knew, when I wrote this, that a female governor - Sarah Palin of Alaska - was about to become only the 2nd woman nominated for Vice President of the U.S. by a major political party! After seeing her "coming out" speech today, I realized McCain may have a clever streak in him after all. Amazingly, his is the ticket that looks like the "choice for change" these days!