Carter Harrison, Jr.

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Carter Harrison, Jr.
30th Mayor of Chicago
Mayor of the City of Chicago
In office 1897 - 1905 – 1911 - 1915
Preceded by	first term George Bell Swift second term Fred A. Busse
Succeeded by	first term Edward Fitzsimmons Dunne second term William Hale Thompson

Born	April 23, 1860 Chicago, Illinois
Died	December 25, 1953 Chicago, Illinois
Political party	Democrat
Spouse	Edith Ogden Harrison
Children	Carter Harrison V, Edith Ogden Harrison II
Residence	Chicago, Illinois

Carter Henry Harrison, Jr. (born: April 23, 1860, Chicago, Illinois; died: December 25, 1953; buried in Graceland Cemetery) served as Mayor of Chicago (1897-1905 and 1911-1915). The City's 30th mayor, he was the first actually born in Chicago.

Like his father, Carter Harrison, Sr., Carter Harrison, Jr. gained election to five terms as Chicago's mayor. Educated in Saxe-Altenburg, Germany, Harrison returned to Chicago to help his brother run the Chicago Times, which their father bought in 1891. Under the Harrisons the paper became a resolute supporter of the Democratic Party, and was the only local newspaper to support the Pullman strikers in the mid-1890s.

Like his father, Harrison the mayor did not believe in trying to legislate morality. However, Harrison was seen as more of a reformer than his father, which helped him garner the middle class votes his father had lacked. One of Harrison's biggest enemies was Charles Yerkes, whose plans to monopolize Chicago's streetcar lines were vigorously attacked by the mayor. During his final term in office, Harrison closed down the Everleigh Club brothel.

Harrison was a hopeful for the 1904 Democratic nomination for President, but was unable to negotiate his way through a tangle of conflicting loyalies to different Party bosses; the nomination went to Alton B. Parker, who was soundly defeated by Theodore Roosevelt.

Carter Harrison Crib

In 1915, when Harrison left office, Chicago had essentially reached its modern size, and had a population of 2,400,000; the city was moving inexorably into its status as a major modern metropolis. He and his father had collectively been mayor of the city for 21 of the previous 36 years. Harrison wrote his autobiography, not once but twice; his wife Edith Ogden Harrison was a well-known writer of children's books and fairy tales in the first two decades of the twentieth century.

Preceded by John P. Hopkins	Mayor of Chicago 1897–1905	Succeeded by Edward F. Dunne
Preceded by Fred A. Busse	Mayor of Chicago 1911–1915	Succeeded by William H. Thompson