With the exception of Nelson Rockefeller, most of those oath-taking Governors had at their sides first ladies who could be expected to make a statehouse into a home—and pick up a few votes on the side. Among them:
Michigan's Lenore LaFount Romney, 52, daughter of a federal radio commissioner under Calvin Coolidge. When Lenore moved to New York to study acting, George Romney, then working in Washington, courted her on weekends. By 1930, she was a bit player for MGM, appeared in movies with Greta Garbo and Jean Harlow. She was on the verge...