Charles Francis Murphy

Murphy was the son of Irish immigrants Dennis Murphy and Mary Pendergrass, With the social club, Murphy formed a baseball team, and with all three groups, Murphy arose as a local political figure. ==Political career==

, the Erie County Democratic leader Murphy's friend and benefactor, Edward Hagan, failed to achieve the Tammany Hall nomination for district assemblyman in 1883, which led Hagan to attempt an independent campaign. Murphy quickly replaced Croker as boss of Tammany Hall. Because of his stance, he is credited with transforming Tammany into a political organization capable of drawing the votes of the ever-growing numbers of new immigrants from Eastern and Southern Europe, which kept Tammany in power until the early 1930s. New York Contracting and Trucking Croker made money through "honest graft." New York Contracting and Trucking was awarded a $6 million contract in 1904 to build rail lines in the Bronx for the New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad. An executive at the railroad said the contract was awarded to avoid friction with Tammany Hall. In response to the contract, the New York State Legislature amended the city's charter so that franchise-awarding power was removed from the city board of aldermen and given to the Board of Estimate and Apportionment, which existed until 1989. By 1905, New York Contracting and Trucking had collected over $15 million in city contracts. Louis N. Hartog business While the United States was at war in 1918, Murphy was receiving income from a firm owned by the businessman Louis N. Hartog in exchange for Murphy's arranging the Corn Products Refining Company to sell Hartog's firm glucose. Hartog would then use the glucose to manufacture malt dextrin, an ingredient in beer. After investing $175,000 in Hartog's firm, Murphy was gaining $5,000 a day from the arrangement. In light of the ongoing war, the unfavorable light it would direct towards Tammany, and the amount of money Murphy received, which he considered too much, Murphy attempted to withdraw from the business. Hartog sued Murphy in response, but Murphy countersued and the case was settled. ==Political influence==

Murphy guided George B. McClellan Jr. to the New York City mayoralty in 1903 over incumbent Seth Low. McClellan was reluctant to reward Murphy with patronage jobs, but Murphy went along with McClellan's decisions. In the 1905 mayoral election, Murphy again guided McClellan to victory, this time over William Randolph Hearst. It was notable since Hearst was then known for ties to the progressive movement and his organization, the Municipal Ownership League, whose goal was the promotion of the public ownership of utilities and transit lines to bring about lower rates and fares. Hearst's newspapers also attacked McClellan's defense of privately owned subways and Murphy's ties to the New York Contracting and Trucking company. After Hearst lost the mayoral election contest, Murphy would try to appease Hearst by appearing to back him for the governorship in 1906, a race Hearst lost. In his second term, McClellan did not react kindly to Murphy's friendliness with Hearst, and during the city's $100 million drinking water infrastructure expansion into the Catskill Mountains, McClellan did not allow Tammany access to the newly created jobs. Following the Triangle Shirtwaist Company fire on March 25, 1911, attention focused on the factories' working conditions. With the assistance of his protégés Robert F. Wagner and Alfred E. Smith, 1913 became a significant year for Tammany Hall in the promotion of progressive reforms. In the city, workplace health regulations were improved, fire alarms were mandated, working hours were reduced for women, a pension system for widowers was introduced, and requirements for insurance were made stricter. At the state level, a referendum on women's suffrage was scheduled and the Public Utility Commission was provided broader powers. In Democratic Party circles, 1914 was a big year since Murphy supported a direct primary system for nomination to all state offices. That angered both Tammany Hall and its boss, Murphy; with his help, the State Assembly voted to impeach Sulzer on counts of perjury and fraud. ==Death==

Murphy died suddenly of what the New York Times termed "acute indigestion," which affected his heart, on April 25, 1924, at his home in New York City. A Roman Catholic, he was given a funeral service at St. Patrick's Cathedral and was buried at Calvary Cemetery in New York. In 1926, a committee raised funds for the erection of a flagpole in Union Square Park as a memorial to Charles F. Murphy. The flagpole was dedicated in 1930 as the Independence Flagstaff, but instead commemorated the signing of the United States Declaration of Independence as a result of public opposition to a memorial to Murphy. In 1985, John J. Murphy Park at Avenue C and the FDR Drive was renamed Murphy's Brother's Playground to honor Charles F. Murphy; the park had been previously named in honor of his brother. ==In popular culture==

's New York Journal (November 10, 1905) In the 1941 film Citizen Kane, screenwriters Herman J. Mankiewicz and Orson Welles based the character of political boss Jim Gettys on Charles F. Murphy. William Randolph Hearst and Murphy were political allies in 1902 when Hearst was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, but the two fell out in 1905 when Hearst ran for mayor of New York City. Hearst was denied the election by a slim margin due to electoral fraud perpetrated by Murphy's organization, and his newspapers retaliated. A historic cartoon of Murphy in convict stripes appeared November 10, 1905, three days after the vote. The caption read, "Look out, Murphy! It's a Short Lockstep from Delmonico's to Sing Sing ... Every honest voter in New York wants to see you in this costume." In Citizen Kane, Boss Jim Gettys admonishes Kane for printing a cartoon showing him in prison stripes: If I owned a newspaper and if I didn't like the way somebody else was doing things—some politician, say—I'd fight them with everything I had. Only I wouldn't show him in a convict suit with stripes—so his children could see the picture in the paper. Or his mother. As he pursues Gettys down the stairs, Kane threatens to send him to Sing Sing. ==References==