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Higher Office(s) Served: Senator

GEORGE ALLISON WILSON, Iowa's twenty-eighth governor, was born in Menlo, Iowa on April 1, 1884. His education was attained at Grinnell College and at Iowa State University, where he earned his law degree in 1907. That same year, he was admitted to the bar and established a legal career in Des Moines. He served as the Polk County assistant attorney from 1912 to 1914, was county attorney from 1915 to 1916, and served on the bench of the District Court from 1917 to 1921. Wilson entered politics in 1926, serving as a member of the Iowa State Senate, a position he held for ten years. He ran unsuccessfully for the governor's office in 1936, but two years later, he won the Republican gubernatorial nomination and was elected governor. He was reelected to a second term in 1940. During his tenure, the board of social welfare was restructured; the state board of assessment and review was eliminated; and anew department of public safety was established, as well as a new tax commission, and a state industry and defense committee. Also, a teacher-tenure bill was sanctioned; and the reapportionment of the state legislature was authorized. Wilson was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1942, but did not take his seat in the senate, until he finished his gubernatorial term on January 14, 1943. After his senatorial term ended on January 3, 1949, Wilson retired from public service. Governor George A. Wilson died on September 8, 1953, and was buried at the Glendale Cemetery in Des Moines, Iowa.

Sources:

Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress

Sobel, Robert, and John Raimo, eds. Biographical Directory of the Governors of the United States, 1789-1978, Vol. 2, Westport, Conn.; Meckler Books, 1978. 4 vols.