27 Facts About Earl Landgrebe

Earl Fredrick Landgrebe was an American politician and businessman who served as a Republican senator in the Indiana Senate and member of the United States House of Representatives.

Earl Fredrick Landgrebe was born on January 21,1916, in Valparaiso, Indiana, to Benna Marie Broderman and Edward William Landgrebe, a grocery store owner who later served as Porter County's assessor.

Earl Landgrebe married Helen Lucille Field on July 12,1936, and had two sons with her.

On March 21,1958, Landgrebe filed to run in the Republican primary to succeed retiring incumbent John Wilson Van Ness for the Indiana Senate seat from Jasper County, Newton County, Porter County and Pulaski County and defeated Mayor John E Wiggins and William A Woodworth.

Later in 1962, Earl Landgrebe announced that he would seek reelection and won the Republican nomination without opposition.

Earl Landgrebe later defeated Democratic nominee Ted Savich in the general election.

State representative Robert D Anderson mounted a primary challenge against him, but Landgrebe narrowly won the Republican nomination with 4,617 votes to Anderson's 4,232 votes.

In 1965, he was reassigned Senate committee positions and was placed onto the Judiciary B, Legislative Apportionment, Public Safety, and Transportation senate committees, but Earl Landgrebe had little power on the apportionment committee due to eight of the eleven members being Democrats.

In 1967, Earl Landgrebe was reassigned to the Labor, Roads, and Transportation senate committees.

Earl Landgrebe represented during the 91st, 92nd and 93rd sessions of congress and was a member of the Education and Labor Committee and a ranking minority member on the Subcommittee on Government Operations and the Subcommittee on Agricultural Labor.

Earl Landgrebe was criticized by Blue and Harrigan for missing multiple votes and not being supportive enough of Nixon.

The Democratic Party fared well nationally during the 1970 House elections and Earl Landgrebe narrowly held onto his seat, by only 1,204 votes against Phillip Sprague.

Earl Landgrebe did not participate in the vote on the amendment, but in the past he had stated he was against lowering the voting age, as the votes of 18 year olds would dilute the votes of older voters.

Earl Landgrebe gained a reputation in Congress as a "colorful loner" with a unique brand of conservatism.

Earl Landgrebe criticized Lyndon B Johnson for reducing bombardment of North Vietnam in 1968 and initially supported the United States' invasion of Cambodia ordered by Nixon, but later came out against it and would rather have had the United States invade North Vietnam.

In 1972, Earl Landgrebe was arrested during an official visit to the Soviet Union to observe their education facilities, due to him distributing Bibles, which he did as he was a devout Lutheran.

Earl Landgrebe was a stalwart defender of President Nixon throughout the Watergate scandal and during the Nixon impeachment hearings.

Earl Landgrebe received a massive backlash from voters in his district for his support of Nixon and was resoundingly defeated in the 1974 election, although this was the only time in his House career that he did not face a primary challenge.

Earl Landgrebe was showered with broken glass and a local sheriff had to break up the incident.

On June 29,1986, Earl Landgrebe died at home from a heart attack at age 70 and was buried in Blanchly Cemetery.

Earl Landgrebe stated that the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia was proof that the Cold War could not be 'thawed'.

Earl Landgrebe opposed the continuation of the Vietnam War, but only supported ending it with an American victory and during his 1968 House campaign he supported ending all foreign aid to North Vietnam.

Earl Landgrebe initially supported the invasion of Cambodia, but later criticized it and instead supported a direct invasion of North Vietnam.

Earl Landgrebe supported Nixon's Peace with Honor plan and cited his ending of the wars in Southeast Asia as one of the reasons he remained loyal to Nixon during the Watergate scandal.

Earl Landgrebe was opposed to any change of the military draft age and stated that the only ones in favor of it were draft dodgers.

Earl Landgrebe was against the legalization of drugs and supported giving the death penalty to non-addicted drug dealers.

Earl Landgrebe supported the "Dangerous Substances Bill" which gave drug dealers sentences from five years to life imprisonment and a mandatory fine of $50,000.