 He was a close friend and associate of Republican U.S.Senator John G. Tower.Eggers' amiable personality was shown in his campaign posters, and he waged aggressive though underfunded races against the conservative Democratic nominee, Preston Smith, a theater owner from Lubbock, who was the lieutenant governor under retiring Governor John B. Connally, Jr.

Eggers was born to a minister, Ernest H. Eggers, and the former Ottilie W. Carre in Seymour in Jackson County in southern Indiana.