Wrench in the Machine: The Shapp Gubernatorial Campaign’s Media Blitz of 1966

Posted by Steve Lilienthal on Nov 11, 2019 in | Comments Off on Wrench in the Machine: The Shapp Gubernatorial Campaign’s Media Blitz of 1966 Pennsylvania and machine politics were synonymous for years, even into the 1960s when reformers and direct primaries thwarted old-style machine politics in other states. Political machines with their control over patronage and nominations had dominated Pennsylvania’s politics since the Civil War, but even the direct primary failed to usher in a new, more open system. That changed suddenly when...
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David L. Lawrence, the Deft Hand Behind Pittsburgh’s – and Pennsylvania’s – Politics

Posted by Richard Robbins on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on David L. Lawrence, the Deft Hand Behind Pittsburgh’s – and Pennsylvania’s – Politics David Leo Lawrence (1889-1966), governor of Pennsylvania from 1959 to 1963, and mayor of Pittsburgh from 1946 to 1959, during the city’s first heralded renaissance, was a professional politician to the very core. Ranked as one of America’s great chief executives among big cities, Lawrence immersed himself in politics, beginning at the age of fourteen when he became a city Democratic...
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