Martin Henry Kennelly was an American politician and businessman. He served as the 47th Mayor of Chicago in Chicago, Illinois from April 15, 1947 until April 20, 1955. Kennelly was a member of the Democratic Party. According to biographer Peter O'Malley, he was chosen as mayor by a scandal-burdened Democratic machine that needed a reformer on top of the ticket. Kennelly was a wealthy businessman and civic leader, active in Irish and Catholic circles. As a long-time opponent of machine politics he accepted the nomination on condition the machine would not pressure him for patronage and that he did not have to play a leadership role in the party. This gave him a non-partisan image that satisfied the reform element. As mayor he avoided partisanship and concentrated on building infrastructure and upgrading the city bureaucracy. He worked to extend civil service; he reorganized inefficient departments. The city took ownership of the mass transit system. He obtained federal aid for slum clearance and public housing projects and for new expressways construction. At his death, Mayor Richard J. Daley, the party leader who defeated Kennelly in a bitter primary battle in 1955, called him, "a great Chicagoan who loved his city" and ordered City hall flags placed at half staff.
Early life
Kennelly was born in Chicago's Bridgeport neighborhood, the youngest of five children. He served in the Army during World War I with the rank of captain. After the war he returned to Chicago and entered the moving and storage business, and lived on the north end of Lake Shore Drive.
Early career
He was the founder and first president of Allied Van Lines, an alliance that united independent local moving and storage companies under a single brand. A contemporary of Marshall Field, a prominent Chicago retailer, Kennelly's moving company got the contract for Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History. After retiring, he was involved in social and civic affairs. He was the head of the Chicago chapter of the American Red Cross during World War II.
Mayor of Chicago
When the city administration of Edward J. Kelly was threatened with defeat by corruption, scandal and Kelly's liberal integrationist policies the Cook County Democratic Party Machine responded by slating Kennelly as a reform candidate. Kennelly returned to the Bridgeport neighborhood and ran for mayor from an apartment in the predominantly Irish American working-class community of his childhood. Kennelly was elected in 1947, receiving 920,000 votes defeating Republican Russell Root. Kennelly oversaw early milestones in the effort to establish a greater degree of self-government for the city of Chicago, creating a Chicago Home Rule Commission in 1953 to study ways for the city to obtain home rule and establish a new city charter. Kennelly proved to be too independent and reform-oriented for his regular Democratic Party sponsors and was dumped by the party bosses at the 1955 endorsement slating in favor of Richard J. Daley. Daley soundly defeated Kennelly in the 1955 Democratic Primary and went on to election in 1955.
