An entertaining and unquestionably eccentric era in Texas politics came to an end on May 11, 1969 with the death of former governor and U.S. Senator “Pappy” O’Daniel.
A job offer from a Fort Worth milling company brought the 35-year-old salesman to Texas in 1925. Three years later, a deal with a group of unemployed musicians put Wilbert Lee O’Daniel on the road to fame and fortune.
Besides plugging their sponsor on the radio, the Light Crust Doughboys performed at the small towns around Fort Worth. During an appearance at Weatherford, O’Daniel filled in for the ailing announcer and was such a hit he became the star of the show.
Taking charge of the daily radio program, he contributed poems and songs as well as his own homespun philosophy. “Beautiful Texas,” the Ohio native’s best known tune, became a statewide standard in no time, and his rambling lectures laced with rock-ribbed religion led many listeners to believe the smooth-talking layman was an ordained minister.
In 1935 O’Daniel created the Hillbilly Flour company and coined the catchy slogan “Please Pass the Biscuits Pappy.” Every day at lunchtime, a million Texans tuned in for the country music, gospel songs and downhome lectures on everything from marital fidelity and child rearing to the Constitution and the scandalous goings-on in state government.
O’Daniel asked his audience on Palm Sunday 1938 to let him know if he should run for governor. On May 1, less than two months before the Democratic primary, he announced the favorable results of the straw poll and his last-minute candidacy.
Few could find fault with the O’Daniel platform and motto – the Ten Commandments and the Golden Rule. On specific issues, which he tended to avoid, the cagey candidate came out against a suggested sales tax, advocated abolition of the poll tax and proposed a $30-a-month pension for all elderly Texans.
The press refused to take the novice seriously, much like a present-day presidential contender, and focused instead on the top contestants. Of the 13 hopefuls in the crowded field, only three were given any chance of winning: Ernest O. Thompson, war hero, former mayor of Amarillo and current railroad commissioner; attorney general William McGraw; and Tom Hunter, a wealthy oilman with three previous gubernatorial bids under his belt.
The brash underdog hit the campaign trail with his radio band, singers Leon Huff and Texas Rose and his three attractive children. Entertainment was the order of the day with O’Daniel always cutting his speeches short so daughter Molly could solicit donations with a miniature barrel labeled “Flour not Pork.”
After stops at Jacksonville and Yoakum, the road show attracted a phenomenal crowd at Waco and the largest turnout ever for a rally in Houston. A swing through West Texas was also a smash success, and by the time he finished his grand tour of the state in late June, O’Daniel was the talk of the otherwise dull campaign.
Nothing seemed to slow Pappy’s bandwagon, not even the embarrassing revelation that he could not vote because he had failed to pay his poll tax.
“He can’t even vote for himself,” editorialized the El Paso Herald Post, “yet he comes before us asking to be made governor of Texas. He has a crust all right, but it’s not light crust. It’s hard and tough and indigestible.”
O’Daniel explained it away with his usual cracker-barrel logic. “I didn’t pay my poll tax because I was fed up with crooked politics in Austin and hadn’t intended to vote for anyone this year. Anyhow, there’s only one thing I’m losing. That’s one vote.”
On Election Day, Pappy proved he didn’t need it. Of the 1.1 million Texans that went to the polls, a decisive majority cast their ballots for the radio pitchman.
When he ran for reelection in 1938, O’Daniel was handicapped by a do-nothing record and a long list of broken promises. He was soon caught in a rhetorical crossfire between young Jerry Sadler, the popular railroad commissioner, and the husband-and-wife team of Jim and Miriam Ferguson, two ex-governors with a large rural following.
The incumbent appeared to lose every battle but still managed to win the war. Sadler finished back in the pack, the Fergusons came in fourth in their last election and Pappy scored another first-round knockout.
Eleven months later, the restless governor changed jobs. He came from 5,000 votes behind the day after the polls closed to beat Congressman Lyndon Baines Johnson in a special election to fill a vacant seat in the United States Senate.
O’Daniel may have been in over his head in Austin, but in Washington he was completely out of his element. He spent seven years in the senate – Texans gave him a full six-year term in 1942 – and not once introduced a bill that received more than four votes.
O’Daniel returned voluntarily to Texas in 1949 and went into private business in Dallas. Seven years later, he came out of retirement to run for governor but lost badly to Price Daniel and Ralph Yarborough with only 22 percent of the vote. In 1958 he tried again to turn back the clock and did even worse.
Poor old Pappy had run out of time, luck and biscuits.
Bartee welcomes your comments and questions at [email protected] or P.O. Box 152, Friendswood, TX 77549 and invites you to visit his web site at barteehaile.com.
