1001 People Who Made America - Alan Axelrod [29]
Daley, Richard J. (1902–1976) Elected mayor of Chicago every four years from 1955 to 1975, Daley was the last of the big city bosses, wielding tremendous power by controlling patronage jobs but also by managing the city with a high level of competence that stimulated growth at a time when many large American cities were in decline. Daley’s dictatorial style caused much outrage—especially for the brutal measures taken against demonstrators during the 1968 Democratic National Convention held in the city—but the mayor also commanded great loyalty from the majority of Chicagoans. His son, Richard M. Daley, became mayor in 1989 and, as of 2006, is still serving.
Darling, Jay Norwood “Ding” (1876–1962) “Ding” Darling was born in Norwood, Michigan, and raised in Sioux City, Iowa. He earned early national fame as a Pulitzer Prize-winning political cartoonist, who worked principally for the Des Moines (Iowa) Register, but his most enduring legacy was as a founder of the Cooperative Wildlife Research Unit at Iowa State College (later Iowa State University), which set the pattern for similar research units all over the nation. He created the first federal duck stamp in 1934, sales of which enabled the purchase of two million acres of national waterfowl habitat.
Darrow, Clarence (1875–1938) Through a long legal career, Darrow earned a reputation as a brilliant attorney defending liberal causes and unpopular people. He was one of the defenders of the Haymarket rioters charged with murder May 4, 1886); he defended socialist labor leader Eugene V. Debs, charged with contempt of court for his leadership of the great Pullman Strike (May–July 1894); he secured acquittal for International Workers of the World (IWW) leader William D. (“Big Bill”) Haywood on murder charges; he defended antiwar protesters in World War I; he saved the infamous child murderers Richard Loeb and Nathan Leopold from execution in 1924; and, in 1925, he defended teacher John T. Scopes, who had violated Tennessee state law by teaching the Theory of Evolution.
Davis, Angela (1944– ) Davis was a Marxist philosophy professor who became an advocate of black revolution during the 1960s and 1970s. When she espoused the cause of another black revolutionary, George Jackson, she was charged in 1970 with kidnapping, murder, and conspiracy for her suspected complicity in an attempted escape and abduction from a California courtroom. An all-white jury acquitted her. In 1991, Davis was named professor of the history of consciousness at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Davis, Benjamin Oliver Jr. (1912–2002) Davis was born in Washington, D.C., the son of Benjamin Oliver Davis Sr., first general officer in the U.S. Army. He graduated from West Point in 1936, as the sole African American at the academy having suffered ostracism by the corps of cadets. Trained at the segregated flight school established at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, Davis led the legendary Tuskegee Airmen in combat during World War II. After the war, in 1954, he became the first African-American general in the USAF. In 1971, he was named assistant secretary for the department of transportation.
Davis, Benjamin Oliver Sr. (1877–1970) Davis was born in Washington, D.C., and studied at Howard University, which he left in 1898 to serve as a lieutenant of volunteers in the Spanish-American War. After the war, he reenlisted in the regular army as a private, rising through the ranks to become in 1940 the segregated U.S. Army’s first African-American general. After World War II, he served as assistant inspector general of the army until his retirement in 1948. His son, Benjamin Oliver