mayorjamesmichaelcurley

J.M. Curley (LOC)

from The Library of Congress

• aware health said:

  James Michael Curley, elected mayor of Boston in 1914: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Michael_Curley A politician's politician.

• Anne (LOC P&P) said:

  rjones0856: Thanks for the additional info. We'll add it to the description next time we update.

• Wystan said:

  In 1914, Curley resigned his seat in Congress to make his first successful run for Mayor of Boston. He was the prototype for the protagonist in Edwin O'Connor's famous political novel, "The Last Hurrah." "In his book, 'The American Mayor,' Melvin Holli explained why Michael Curley was voted the fourth-worst mayor in American history (1999) "A worst-list without Boston's "lovable scoundrel" Mayor J. Michael Curley (1914-17, 1922-25, 1930-33, 1946-49), also known as the "last-hurrah mayor," would be like corned beef without cabbage on St. Patrick's Day. Twice jailed, the unstoppable Curley made more political comebacks than a dying opera diva. A masterful and cynical exploiter of his own people's poverty, he inflamed the ethnocultural conflict of his city and turned Boston city politics into a three-ring circus for half a century. Although, as his biographer Jack Beatty shows, Curley grossly enriched himself at public expense and lived far beyond the means of an honest public servant, financial self-aggrandizement was not really what Curley was about. Curley lived for politics and loved coming in first, no matter which office or honor he ran for. He undoubtedly would have resented coming in fourth-worst in a ten-person field, had he lived to see this expert survey." --Quoted from an internet page