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Boss William Marcy Tweed - The Corrupt Politician

On April 3rd,1823, Tweed was born at 1 Cherry street, close to where the Brooklyn Bridge is today. His father had a chair making business at 24 Cherry. His father Richard Tweed who was a blacksmith on Rutgers street and his mother Eliza lived at 1 Cherry Street at the top of the hill. Boss William Marcy Tweed was the baby of his family, he had 2 older brothers and two older sisters. Boss Tweed's first occupations were a chairmaker, a bookeeper for a saddle-maker and also kept books for a Pearl street manufacturer of brushes. At 21 years old blue eyed William Tweed married 17 year old Mary Jane Skaden in 1844, and moved into a top floor room in her fathers house at 193 Madison street.

Cherry Street and Pearl Street is no longer an intersection, due to the building of the Brooklyn Bridge, but it was near Tweeds birthplace. Tweed was a fireman, a member of the Big Six, but he became a corrupt politician. For six year after 1865, Tweed stole almost $200,000,000, starting the Panic of 1873. What a cover. During the draft riots of 1863 Boss Tweed was Deputy Street Commissioner.

Boss William Marcy Tweed built hospitals and orphanages, widened Broadway and got land for Metropolitan Museum of Art. Tweed's mansion at 45th and Fifth avenue had a near by stable full of horses. John Jacob Astor and other rich New Yorkers signed a baseless certificate of character supporting Tweed (who was the third largest owner of Manhattan real estate). Tweed owned two yachts, and a race horse, he could afford them his organization raked in 1-4 billion in todays dollars.

Tweed's stickpin was ten and a half carats, he also wore a blue-white gem in his shirt. Some called him the Santa Claus with a diamond pin Almost 6 foot tall, Tweed was a 300 pound non smoking non drinking ringleader of corrupt city officials, law makers and contractors. Tweed's City Hall lunch club fed his organization using fraud, money-laundering and profit sharing. The Tweed Ring pillaged approximately $13 million in city funds and used the construction of the county courthouse as a pretext to embezzle millions of dollars.

Commissioner of Public Works was one of Tweed's titles. Tweed controlled every office in the city government. Tweeds ring controlled the courts, legislature, treasury and the ballot boxes. Peter Sweeny, head of the Department of Parks was part of Tweeds City Hall lunch club that started his Ring of corruption called the Tammany Ring. Tweeds organization used money-laundering, and profit sharing to commit fraud with the help of Comptroller Richard Connolly. Upstate Republicans were bribed to maintain Tweeds system of honest graft, which also applied to Mayor A. Oakey Hall.

Tweeds illicit profits made him the third biggest owner of NYC real estate, and a pal of Mayor John Hoffman. After the prosecutors immense legal costs, Tweed alone became the scapegoat, but he was not the only one of the Ring that served time in jail (James H. Ingersoll spent 2 1/2 years in jail). Other Tweed Ring members were Sheriff Matthew Brennan, Mayor John Hoffman, James Kelso, and James O'Brien.

Referring to Thomas Nasts cartoon images of himself, Tweed said My constituents do not know how to read, but they can not help seeing them damned pictures. Other quotes included: Nine men out of ten either know me or I know them; and As long as I count the votes, what are you going to do about it? Boss Tweeds last words around noon on April 12, 1878 were I hope they are satisfied now. Tweeds last words were said right after he said Well, Tilden (Samuel Jones Tilden, the New York governor) and Fairchild (Charles Fairchild, the New York State attorney general) have killed me. Tweed died April 12 of the same year (1878) in a debtors prison on Ludlow street, and was buried in Brooklyn's Green-Wood Cemetery.

Tweed said If I could have bought newspapermen as easily as I did members of the Legislature, I wouldn't be in the fix I am now. The Evening Post, tried to aid the Tweed ring, but it was too late. Tweed underestimated his enemies, and made a full confession (even admiting to things he was not even involved in). Ironically, Tweed was convicted in the structure (now called Tweed Courthouse at 52 Chambers) that he was responsible for building, on the south side of Chambers Street just west of Centre Street. $250,000 was the amount of the original budget of the Tweed Courthouse, it ended up almost costing twice what United States spent to purchase Alaska in 1867. It took 11 years (1861 -1872) to finish the Tweed Courthouse.

During renovations of the Tweed Courthouse, in 1999 they removed the cast iron and 18 layers of paint as well as putting in new floors and roof. The triangular open space at East Broadway and Canal Street, now known as Nathan Strauss square, was once called Rutgers square, but it also had Tweed's name on the space as well, when it was called Tweed Plaza.

Henry Street and Gouverneur Street was the location of Engine #6, the fire station Tweed was in charge of. Board of Supervisors members Orison Blunt, Boss Tweed and Mayor George Opdyke worked together to solve the draft riot problem. Police, firemen and state militiamen were to be exempt to protect NYC. 2 million dollars of bonds sold on Wall street created a fund to pay poor workmen (decided on a case by case basis) who could never afford the $300 commutation fee. These poor draftees would be tempted with $300 cash to join Lincoln's army.

Orison Blunt and Boss Tweed went on a secret mission in late August 1863, to the War Department in Washington D.C. to meet with secretary of war Edwin Stanton and the head of the draft James Barnet Fry (not Lincoiln). This meeting gave Tammany Hall through the Board of Supervisors the right to run Lincoln's NYC draft. 5,000 poor people gathered outside Tweed's son in law, Frederick Douglass's apartment at 68 E 77th street. Tweed's coffin was oak with oxydized silver handles, that was draped with black silk velvet on the outside and quilted white satin on the inside. Plot 6,477 was just north of the entrance to the Greenwood cemetery in Brooklyn.

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