Brooklyn Today for January 4, 2013

January 4, 2013 Brooklyn Daily Eagle
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Good morning. Today is the fourth day of the year. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle of Jan. 4, 1902, reported on alleged attempts by Tammany Hall operatives to bribe newly elected representatives of the Board of Alderman, the ancestor of today’s City Council. A spokesman for Mayor Seth Low charged that a Tammany alderman said to a Fusion (a coalition of liberal Democrats and Republicans) alderman, “I have $5,000 in my pocket. I will give you that for your vote. If that is not enough, name your price, and I see what I can do.”

Tammany Hall, for those who don’t know, was a powerful Manhattan Democratic organization that specialized in patronage and the “spoils system.” After consolidation, it spread into Brooklyn as well. It was weakened by Mayor LaGuardia in the 1930s and was dealt the coup de grace by the Reform Democratic movement in the 1950s.

Well-known people who were born today include actress Ann Magnuson, Hall of Fame football coach and player Don Shula, signer Michael Stipe of REM and actress Dyan Cannon (“Heaven Can Wait,” “Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice”).


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