Iowa’s new governor admits he’s not exactly a household name in the Hawkeye state. Earlier this week, Governor Chet Culver told yet another story about not being recognized in public. "Just about a week ago I took my wife and two kids, John and Claire, out to Sonic — the drive-in hamburger place," Culver said Tuesday night during a speech in Des Moines. Culver said the young woman who delivered the food to their truck asked if she had met the family before.
"I said, ‘Yeah, how did you know the name?’" Culver asked. The young woman explained she’d seen the name ‘Culver’ on the bumper of the family vehicle, then she followed up with a question: "You just ran for something, didn’t you?" Culver told her he had run for governor. The woman asked how he had done. "We explained we had done very well," Culver said.
Just before he was inaugurated, Culver told another crowd in Des Moines that he’d recently been mistaken for not only Governor Tom Vilsack but another waitress thought he was Republican Jim Nussle, Culver’s rival in the November election. "I have still have some work to do," Culver says. "Not everyone understands that there’s a new governor." Culver took office on Friday, January 12th.