20 days. Thus, Charles McDowell became Governor of Alabama on July 10 and 11, 1924. Known as "Plain Bill," Brandon led the Alabama delegation to the 1924 Democratic National Convention, the first such convention to be broadcast via radio. The convention was marked by a deadlock between the supporters of the Irish Catholic New York Governor Al Smith and former Secretary of the Treasury William Gibbs McAdoo (the son-in-law of former President Woodrow Wilson) whose candidacy was backed by the anti-Catholic Ku Klux Klan. Neither candidate was able to get the required two-thirds of the delegates as critical delegations, including Alabama's, clung to their "favorite son" candidates. In Alabama's case, the favorite son was Senator Oscar Underwood. The Convention became the longest continually running convention in history, as 103 ballots were taken before a compromise candidate, John W. Davis, was nominated. As the first state alphabetically, Alabama led every ballot, and Brandon, reporting the state's unanimous vote tally ballot after ballot, became the symbol of the convention's deadlock. For a time, his booming southern drawl heard on the radio, repeatedly declaring, "Alabama casts twenty-four votes for Oscar W. Underwood," became one of the most recognizable voices in the country. After leaving the governorship in 1927, Brandon was appointed to his former office of Probate Judge of Tuscaloosa County by his onetime political opponent Governor Graves. Brandon married Elizabeth Andrews Nabors, a widow with two daughters, on June 27, 1900. He died in Tuscaloosa aged 66 on December 7, 1934, and is interred at Tuscaloosa Memorial Park. References External links Biography from the Alabama Department of Archives and History 1868 births 1934 deaths People from Talladega, Alabama Methodists from Alabama Governors of Alabama Alabama lawyers Politicians from Tuscaloosa, Alabama American people of the Spanish–American War Democratic Party governors of Alabama