The late O. E. Rolvaag's 1924 classic Giants in the Earth portrayed the trials of a yeoman Norwegian family that strove doggedly to conquer the Great Plains, only to be consumed in the struggle. The author's son, Minnesota Governor Karl Fritjof Rolvaag, 52, has come to experience the same sort of futility. Though he has been a dedicated, longtime party worker, Minnesota's Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party last week dumped him in a bruising convention fight for the party's gubernatorial endorsement. Picked instead was ambitious, boyish-looking Lieutenant Governor A. M. ("Sandy") Keith, 37.
Kennedy...