Early Life and Education
Warren Magnuson was born in Moorhead, Minnesota. His birth date is given as April 12, 1905, but the actual records of his birth are sealed. He apparently never knew his birth parents; according to various sources, his parents either died within a month of his birth, or his unmarried mother put him up for adoption. He was adopted by William Grant and Emma (née Anderson) Magnuson, who gave him their name. The Magnusons were second-generation Scandinavian immigrants who operated a bar in Moorhead, and who adopted a daughter named Clara a year after adopting Warren. His adoptive father left the family in 1921.
Magnuson attended Moorhead High School, where he played quarterback on the football team and was captain of the baseball team. While attending high school, he ran a YMCA camp, worked in the wheat farms, and delivered newspapers and telegrams in Moorhead and in nearby Fargo, North Dakota. He graduated in 1923, and then enrolled at the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks. In 1924, he transferred to the North Dakota Agricultural College in Fargo, which he attended for a year. He then traveled through Canada for a period of time, riding freight trains and working with threshing crews.
Magnuson followed a high school girlfriend to Seattle, Washington, where he entered the University of Washington in 1925. He was a member of the Theta Chi fraternity, and worked delivering ice as a member of the Teamsters under Dave Beck. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1926, and earned a Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of Washington School of Law in 1929. A Democrat, he first became active in politics in 1928, volunteering for A. Scott Bullitt for governor and Al Smith for president.
Read more about this topic: Warren Magnuson
Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or education:
“I have always had something to live besides a personal life. And I suspected very early that to live merely in an experience of, in an expression of, in a positive delight in the human cliches could be no business of mine.”
—Margaret Anderson (1886–1973)
“In European thought in general, as contrasted with American, vigor, life and originality have a kind of easy, professional utterance. American—on the other hand, is expressed in an eager amateurish way. A European gives a sense of scope, of survey, of consideration. An American is strained, sensational. One is artistic gold; the other is bullion.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
“Tell my son how anxious I am that he may read and learn his Book, that he may become the possessor of those things that a grateful country has bestowed upon his papa—Tell him that his happiness through life depends upon his procuring an education now; and with it, to imbibe proper moral habits that can entitle him to the possession of them.”
—Andrew Jackson (1767–1845)