William Langer
William "Wild Bill" Langer CC 1910 was Governor of North Dakota and later Senator from the same state. Before enrolling at Columbia, he somehow attended the University of North Dakota Law School and passed the state bar at the age of 18, which may say more about the ease of passing the bar in North Dakota than it does about Langer. Despite his performance, he was judged too young to actually practice law, hence his further studies at Columbia, where he indeed proved himself a worthy pupil by graduating both valedictorian and winning the Rolker Prize for outstanding student.
Langer was also a member of Philo, business manager of the Spectator, and was voted by classmates as the "biggest politician, noisiest student, most popular man, and the one most likely to succeed".[1]
Although he was a Republican, Spec also reported that he was a "maverick" who "voted against his party more often than for it" which is probably why his political career ended when President Dwight Eisenhower refused to endorse him.
Somehow, he is not the only famous Columbia alumnus to have been nicknamed "Wild Bill," the other being William Joseph Donovan, onetime U.S. spy chief.
