The Good Government Man

“An excellent new biography.” — Raleigh News & Observer

“Covington has proven to be a master biographical historian.” — North Carolina Historical Review

“Howard Covington Jr. has captured on these pages one of the great public spirits of our time. Albert Coates made government interesting and personal, and in its advocacy became one of the legendary figures in our history. None of his students will forget him; North Carolinians are most grateful to him. All of us remember his lovely Gladys who was his lifelong companion and a distinguished public servant herself. You will enjoy this story of an idea that grew in full flower to be of service to the people.”—illiam C. Friday, President Emeritus, University of North Carolina

“This history of the fearlessly creative academic entrepreneur Albert Coates is also a bracing history of UNC itself and a richly-peopled saga of the state’s 20th century public life. Great figures that stride through Coates’s life include novelist Thomas Wolfe, U.S. senators Frank Graham and Sam Ervin Jr., N.C. Supreme Court Chief Justice Susie Sharp, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, and all North Carolina governors from Locke Craig to Terry Sanford. No less great a figure is Coates’s wife, Gladys, his lifelong love and partner. Throughout the sheer drama of it all, theirs is a path of real adventure and romance recounted with great skill by Howard Covington Jr.”—ichael R. Smith, dean of the School of Government, University of North Carolina