Early Childhood and Adulthood
The child of a working-class mining family of six children in Valdez, Egan was raised by his mother Cora following his father William's death in an avalanche in 1920. By age 10, Egan was working in a local cannery, helping to support his struggling family. Thanks to the lack of driving laws in the Alaska Territory during the 1920s, Egan learned to drive at an early age, shuttling tourists around during summer months. By the age of 14, Egan was driving dump trucks for the Alaska Road Commission. Following his graduation as a valedictorian from Valdez High School in 1932, and began an interest in politics.
Egan's godfather, Anthony Dimond, a local Valdez lawyer, two-time mayor and member of the Alaska Senate, ran as a Democrat for the territory's nonvoting delegate to the federal U.S. House of Representatives the same year. Despite the position's inability to vote due to the Tennessee Plan, a nonvoting delegate could address other House members and lobby for both bills and statehood. Dimond won the race, introducing the young Egan, who viewed Dimond as his mentor, to territorial and federal politics. Dimond would send copies of Congressional Record back to Egan in Valdez for reading.
Read more about this topic: William Allen Egan
Famous quotes containing the words early, childhood and/or adulthood:
“The early Christian rules of life were not made to last, because the early Christians did not believe that the world itself was going to last.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“Toddlerhood resembles adolescence because of the rapidity of physical growth and because of the impulse to break loose of parental boundaries. At both ages, the struggle for independence exists hand in hand with the often hidden wish to be contained and protected while striving to move forward in the world. How parents and toddlers negotiate their differences sets the stage for their ability to remain partners during childhood and through the rebellions of the teenage years.”
—Alicia F. Lieberman (20th century)
“For a boy to reach adulthood feeling that he knows his father, his father must allow his emotions to be visible—hardly an easy task when most males grow up being either subtly or openly taught that this is not acceptable behavior. A father must teach his son that masculinity and feelings can go hand in hand.”
—Kyle D. Pruett (20th century)