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Goodwin Jess Knight (December 9, 1896 - May 22, 1970) was the 31st Governor of California.
He was born in Utah, but his family moved to Los Angeles when he was a boy. His father, Jess Knight, was a mining engineer, but Goodwin followed in his mother's (Lille) father's (John B. Milner) footsteps. This grandfather was a judge in Provo, Utah.
He attended high school in Los Angeles, at Manual Arts High School. One of his classmates was Jimmy Doolittle. He went on to Stanford University and also Cornell University. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War I.
Knight was a judge of the Superior Court in Los Angeles beginning in 1935. He was reelected in 1936 and 1942 without significant opposition. His case load varied from the glamorous to the mundane. He oversaw weddings and divorces for Hollywood starlets. He began his political career in 1944, when he pursued the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate. He bowed out early, though, to back Fred Houser.
He was elected as the Lieutenant Governor under Earl Warren in 1943. He became Governor himself when Earl Warren resigned to become Chief Justice of the United States.
His first wife, Arville, died of a heart attack on October 29, 1952. He and Arville had two daughters. He married Virginia Carlson on August 2, 1954 at the Episcopal Church of Our Savior in Los Angeles. Virginia Carlson's first husband, Lt. Lyle Carlson was killed in action in World War II.
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