A Secret Life_ The Lies and Scandals of President Grover Cleveland - Charles Lachman [60]
Down the alphabetical lineup of counties went the roll call. Then came the turn of New York County, the largest in the state. Manhattan was split between the forces of reform and those aligned with Tammany Hall, alienated from each other, and barely on speaking terms. All thirty-eight reformist delegates switched to Cleveland. That did it. Boss Kelly of Tammany Hall gave his men a stiff nod of assent, and 23 votes were suddenly swung for Cleveland. Kelly became the convention’s kingmaker, even if he loathed the politics of the king he had just crowned.
Pandemonium reigned. Delegate after delegate rose and demanded to be recognized so that they too could switch their votes to Cleveland. It was a stampede.
At 4:00 a.m., the final tally came in: Cleveland, 211 and Slocum, 156. Flower’s support had gone up in smoke. He ended with only 15 votes.
The band struck up the “Red, White and Blue.” In the gallery, Mahoney shouted himself hoarse with joy and watched in pure bliss as a Cleveland lithograph he had brought with him to such mockery was unfurled on the platform.
News from the convention reached New York City during one of the most drenching rainstorms in the city’s history—more than six inches of water fell in the deluge, rinsing the filthy streets of mud and garbage until the water looked as pure as a mountain stream. Old-timers said they could not recall a day when New York seemed so cleansed. Over at Grand Central Depot, the rain-delayed train from Syracuse pulled in two hours late. Boss Kelly, wearing a white straw hat, alighted from the drawing-room car with his crew of Tammany warriors, grinning like a “conqueror” and declaring that Cleveland was sure to win the big race in November. The Tammany boss was last seen that night getting into a carriage that went rattling down the cobblestone streets to his home on Madison Avenue.
In Buffalo, the telegraph service flashed word of the Cleveland victory with these words from Bissell: “You are nominated.” A cheering mob of Democrats awaiting the results at City Hall moved en masse to Billy Dranger’s saloon, where they heard that Cleveland was having a drink. Dranger’s was known locally as the Sewer, for the restaurant in the basement.
Cleveland saw the horde spilling into the streets outside the saloon. He went to the balcony, where everyone could have a good look at him.
“My friends . . . I cannot but remember tonight the time when I came into your midst, friendless, unknown, and poor. I cannot but remember how, step-by-step, by the encouragement of my good fellow citizens, I have gone on to receive more of their appreciation than is my due, until I have been honored with more distinction, perhaps, than I deserve.”
The crowd roared.
7
THE GODDESS
FRANCES FOLSOM HAD been only eleven when her father died, and ever since, Grover Cleveland had been a guiding force in her life. She called him Uncle Cleve, and he called her Frank. He was always there for her, like a second father.
Cleveland showered Frances with generous gifts, the most memorable being a frisky bull terrier puppy; and on warm summer days, he took her to Beaver Island. Reachable only by steam launch, this small jut of land, a thousand acres or so off the head of Grand Island, was where Cleveland and other prominent citizens of Buffalo had organized a social community of movers and shakers known as the Beaver Island Club. The Jolly Reefers, as they called themselves, were used to seeing Cleveland holding the chubby little girl by the hand as he showed her around the island’s rose garden and towering trees or brought her to a picnic or a clambake. They were aware that in Cleveland’s capacity as executor of the Oscar Folsom estate, he was involved in Frances’s life, and it was