GEORGIA: Talmadge II

Just eight days after Louisiana sent Huey Long's snub-faced son Russell to the U.S. Senate, Georgia voters triumphantly revived a political dynasty of their own. Trooping to the polls under a sizzling sun, they elected tobacco-chewing, red-gallused Herman ("Hummon") Talmadge, 35, to fill the last two years of tobacco-chewing, red-gallused Ol' Gene's term as governor. It was like old times again.

On election night drunken wool-hatters and their blowzy, sweating women careened down the corridors of Atlanta's Ansley Hotel, howling and whooping. In Room 723, Hummon and his handsome second wife, Betty, listened to the returns. As the results from...