Word: curleyism
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Under the ordinary rules of politics, Boston's Mayor James Michael Curley would have no more chance of re-election in November than of playing halfback for Harvard. At 74, after 50 years in politics (four terms as mayor, four as a U.S. Representative, one as governor), he had suffered at one time or another from diabetes, arteriosclerosis, hypertension and ingrown eyelashes. He had served two penal sentences (the last, in 1947 for mail fraud) and during his stewardship Boston's debt and high taxes have increased, and its reputation for corruption has not declined...
...with Curley, as with Boston, the ordinary rules did not apply. Last week, as the mayoralty campaign heated up, the old man got up at 6 each morning, spent hours bestowing favors, made appearances at football games, banquets, parades and public meetings. Despite his age and ailments, he still managed the mellow eloquence and the matchless gall which had made him the darling of the Boston streets. Though his principal opponents were Irishmen like himself, he spoke as though he were a protector of the people crusading against the Boston Brahmins...
Boston's anti-Curley Democrats and Republicans had refused to form a coalition. The noisiest of them was young (38), tough Democratic Candidate Patrick J. Sonny McDonough who had a lot of tricks from Curley's book. He was tearing through the streets like a wild man, handing out free combs to the ladies and green address books to the men, singing Galway Bay and reciting Curley's sins at the top of his lungs. Another Democrat (John B. Hynes), a Republican and a Progressive were also clacking away at Curley's sins...
...Boston, Mayor James Curley, who has done time on a mail fraud rap, took a backward look at his life & hard times. "I might have taken the primrose path," he admitted righteously, "but I chose the thorny path-trying to do something for the needy, the unfortunate. Any man that takes the hard, thorny road will always be accused of being a boss and a buccaneer...
Watching the first night football game ever played in San Francisco's Kezar Stadium (before 40,000 spectators), Sports Editor Vernon ("Curley") Grieve of Hearst's Examiner got so excited last week that he thought he heard voices. Wrote Grieve: "When Mayor Elmer G. Robinson turned on the floodlights ... a huge gasp escaped from the throng and it rolled upward like escaped steam from a huge boiler. It was then-unanimously-that the crowd mumbled: 'This is grand. This is what we need and want...