Before the Philadelphia convention next June, a major job of the nation's voters will be to absorb, weigh and compare the records in the Republican Who's Who of presidential candidates. Herewith, in the second of a series, TIME publishes the condensed biography and political record of California's Governor Earl Warren.
Vital Statistics. Age: 57 (born March 19, 1891 in a five-room frame house on Los Angeles' dingy Turner Street). Ancestry: his grandfather was Halvar Varran, a Norwegian carpenter, who came to the U.S. with his wife and two sons, settled in Iowa and anglicized his name; his father, Methias H. Warren,—born in Norway, moved from Iowa to California, became a master carbuilder for the Southern Pacific. His mother, Crystal Hernland, was the daughter of Swedish immigrants. Educated: Kern County (Calif.) high school, the University of California (1912), U. of C.'s School of Jurisprudence (1914). Married: in 1925, to Mrs. Nina Palmquist Meyers, a young Oakland widow with a son, James. Children: James, 28 (adopted); Virginia, 19; Earl Jr. ("Juju"), 18; Dorothy, 16; Nina Elizabeth ("Honey Bear"), 14; Robert, 13. Church: Protestant.
Personal Traits. A big (6 ft. 1 in., 215 Ibs.), smiling, pink-cheeked, blue-eyed Westerner, with thinning grey hair and an easy, friendly manner, he specializes in the homely, forthright phrase, a booming laugh, and a bone-crushing handshake; wears well-tailored blue, grey or brown suits, flashy ties, rimless glasses or glasses with colorless horn rims. He has a standing order that his office door remain open to all callers. He is a joiner: the American Legion, the Elks, the Masons (33rd degree and past Grand Master of California), the Native Sons of the Golden West.
Career. A lawyer by profession, he has been appointed to three public offices (deputy city attorney for Oakland, 1919-20; deputy district attorney of Alameda County, 1920-25; district attorney for unexpired term, 1925); elected to three (district attorney for Alameda County in 1926, re-elected in 1930 and 1934, state Attorney General, 1938; Governor in 1942, re-elected in 1946 on both Republican & Democratic tickets); never defeated in any election. He was Republican state chairman from 1934 to 1936, national committeeman from 1936 to 1938, keynoter of the National Republican Convention in Chicago in 1944 (when he put a damper on the vice-presidential boomlet started in his behalf).
Private Life. He lives in Sacramento's ornate Governor's Mansion, once the boyhood home of Journalist Lincoln Steffens, now converted from an ugly relic into a gleaming legacy of the gingerbread era. He has given up golf and handball. He reads extensively on contemporary problems, dips regularly into his Bible before going to bed and first thing in the morning. His hobby and main relaxation is his lively family. Between fishing trips with his sons, horseback riding with his daughters, near-monthly birthday parties for one Warren or another, he has time for few friends, fewer intimates.