The Creole-Tomato’s This Day in History
Golden Mayoral Moments

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2005: Former mayor Marc Morial, certain of his relatives, and former associates became the focus of federal investigations into corruption during his administration. Morial’s uncle Glenn Haydel was accused of defrauding the Regional Transit Authority of a half-million dollars in a fraudulent bond refinancing scheme.

1984: During Ernest N. Morial’s second mayoral term, economic decline and increased conflict with the City Council led to a decrease in the ability of the Morial administration to govern effectively. After serving two terms as mayor, he was prevented by the City Charter from seeking a third term. He twice tried to convince voters to change the Charter to allow him to run again.

1935: Walmsley, a member of New Orleans’s exclusive Boston Club, moved in the highest social circles of the city. The patrician mayor set a pro-business tone for his administration when as one of his first acts as mayor he confronted a militant strike by the city’s streetcar workers. He also fired almost two thousand black city employees by enforcing a Jim Crow law banning the employment of non-voters.

1920: Martin Behrman, an American Democratic politician, was the longest-serving mayor in New Orleans history. Martin Behrman was from the city of New York.

1880: After struggling to take power from ‘The Ring,” Joseph A Shakspeare won office of Mayor of New Orleans. He appointed David C. Hennessy as chief of police. Hennessy’s assassination in October 1890, allegedly by members of the Sicilian Mafia, sparked an anti-Italian riot in which the parish prison was stormed and eleven Italian immigrants were lynched.

1828: Mayor Roffignac sought to develop the city as fast as possible, borrowing large sums of money by issuing “city stock”, a form of municipal bonds. He used the money to improve and beautify the city. He resigned in 1828 and returned to France. He died at his château, under curious circumstances: according to the medical examiner called in to determine the precise cause of his death, he had been sitting in his invalid chair, examining a loaded pistol, when he was suddenly overwhelmed by an apoplectic stroke and fell to the floor; in the fall, the pistol fired into his brain.