I just learned about this over the weekend and I can't find any thread on Atlas that ever discussed this rather amazing story:
So, just like this year there was a major independent candidate in the Governor's race, only in 1930 the independent did much better
https://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=20&year=1930&f=0&off=5&elect=0In fact, he may have won, except he filed so late (in September) that he had to run as a write-in candidate and 3 days before the election the KS Attorney General in a obvious effort to kneecap his vote declared that any votes that didn't have John R. Brinkley written exactly as such, should not be counted.
Who is this John R. Brinkley who came out of nowhere to almost win the Kansas Governorship? Basically, he's a character so absurd, you would have thought he walked out of a Coen brothers movie.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_R._BrinkleyIn short, he was a con-artist with a fake medical degree who discovered the power of radio and got rich off of a medical "treatment" that would restore men's vitality via the power of goat testicles. He ran on a depression style campaign that promised a lake in every county (really), but his real motivation for running was that the state had revoked his medical license and he wanted to appoint a new board to get it back. (California had actually issued a warrant for his arrest in 1924 for medical quackery but the Gov of Kansas refused to extradite him because he was too valuable to the state).
Brinkley owned his own radio station to promote his various medical rackets, his love for Jesus, and a popular country music musician of the day who campaigned with him.
After losing he ran again in 1932 again coming up just short despite not being a write-in candidate this time. Even though the vote percentages were similar, the maps for the two elections were wildly different.
https://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=20&year=1932&f=0&off=5&elect=0His story goes on as he flees to the Texas border and would broadcast from Mexico in an effort to thwart the feds who are determined to prosecute him one way or the other. There have been a couple of books written, a documentary titled "Nuts!" and a podcast that got on Richard Linklater's radar and he's developing a movie with Robert Downey Jr.
Of course, as a politic nerd, I'd love to know more about the two elections. I know things could get a little wild during the depression, but this was just wack and the voter shifts between the two elections are just a whole other baffling dimension.
