TEXAS: Where Everything Is More So

(3 of 7) A Good Marriage. Shivers (rhymes with rivers) was born Oct. 5, 1907 at Lufkin, where his father, Robert A. Shivers, was clerking in a store. Later, the elder Shivers practiced law at Woodville, then became a district judge at Port Arthur. Young Allan, a studious boy, hung around the courthouse so much

(3 of 7)

A Good Marriage. Shivers (rhymes with rivers) was born Oct. 5, 1907 at Lufkin, where his father, Robert A. Shivers, was clerking in a store. Later, the elder Shivers practiced law at Woodville, then became a district judge at Port Arthur. Young Allan, a studious boy, hung around the courthouse so much that he acquired a nickname: "Judge."

Allan went off to study law at the University of Texas, but dropped out at the end of the first year because the family purse was nearly empty. After working as a laborer and clerk for an oil company for 2½ years, he finally got back to the university. Then, during vacations, he worked as a subscription salesman for TIME. After law school, he went into his father's law office in Port Arthur. Practice was meager, but at the end of his first year he settled a case with a big fee: $800. With that, Shivers launched himself in politics.

He was the youngest (26) man elected to the Texas senate up to that time. He soon won recognition as a studious, hardworking legislator. In the 1936 special session, he helped draft old-age-assistance legislation and was considered "almost a New Dealer."

In 1937, Allan Shivers became a millionaire—by marriage. At a yachting party at Port Arthur in 1935, the young state senator had met pretty Marialice Shary, adopted daughter and only child of John Shary, pioneer real-estate promoter in the lower Rio Grande Valley. They were married on his 30th birthday. When John Shary died in 1945, Shivers became general manager of the mammoth John H. Shary Enterprises, which include vast citrus fruit groves, nurseries and canneries, farms, ranches, real estate, irrigation and oil-development companies, and a weekly newspaper (the Mission, Texas Times).

Cadillacs & a Ford. The Shivers family (four children: John Shary, 12; Allan Jr., 6; Marialice Sue, 4; and Brian McGee, 6 weeks) lives most of the time at the governor's mansion in Austin, built in 1853 and now partially air-conditioned. They spend some of their time at Sharyland, the hotel-like headquarters of the Shary enterprises at Mission, and some at the Shivers farm near Woodville. Although Shivers owns two Cadillac limousines, he has been driving—in this election year—a red Ford sedan (with a Mercury engine and an air-conditioning system).

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