Daley, Richard

Cultural  

1. A mayor of Chicago in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. One of the last and toughest of the big-city political “bosses,” he ran a powerful political machine, repeatedly and easily gaining reelection. He was also given much of the credit for the victory of John F. Kennedy in the close presidential election of 1960; Kennedy won by only a few thousand votes in Illinois. In 1968, when demonstrators against involvement of the United States in the Vietnam War threatened to disrupt the Democratic national convention, meeting in Chicago, the Chicago police, with Daley's approval, responded with violence. An official investigation later described the response as a “police riot.” Daley died in 1976.

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Daley's organization also gave Chicago's government a reputation for quick responses to problems; Chicago was called a “city that works.”

Example Sentences

But the series shares the outsize ambition of its hero, Tom Kane, played by Mr. Grammer as a modern-day version of the first Mayor Daley, Richard J. Daley, the boss of the Chicago Democratic machine.

From New York Times