The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1906-06-16
SCHM|Tz Of FRISCO
MOST UNIQUE FIGURE

MU5l UN|QUt t|6URt
A unique figure In American NUM-
c1pal politics is Eugene E. SchmitZ,
mayor of San Francisco.
Neither millionaire, not politician is
Schmitz, but just plain man of the
people, member and officer of one of
the labor unions, fiddler who fidd!ed
only at union rates, translated sud-
denly by one of the inexplicable
twists and turns of city politics from
the sphere Of leader of the Columbia
Theater orchestra to the highest
place within the gift of his fellow
townsmen.
1t was the greatest surprise San
Francisco ever provided for herself at
the polls when she chose for her
mayor this fiddler, schmitz, the can
didate and the standard bearer of the
Union Labor Party, says the Pitts
burg Dispatch. It was all the more
surprising because the party which
he led was the direct and immediate
result of one of the most bitter con-
tests the Pacific coast has seen be-
tween organized labor and organized
capital; because the Union Labor par.
ty stood for nothing else but organ
lied labor, which had won only an
empty victory, If indeed it could be
called a victory at ALL and because
most important of all-under a new
charter the office of mayor had been
invested with powers so extensive as
to make the title of chief executive
officer of the municipality mean ex-
actly what the words imply.
Personally Schmitz is anything but
a mean figure of a man. He bulks
large upon the stage of which he just
now holds the center. There is more
than six good American feet of him,
and enough of girth to give him
scales record of POS pounds, with not
an apparent ounce of fat. He is
straight as any aborigine, clear-eyed,
muscular as man ought to be who
eats and drinks only what is good for
him, takes as much of his life as he
can in the open, and finds his recrea-
tion In tramping afield behind we'll
bred bird dog, ir in whipping the
pools and ripples of every accessible
trout stream, or in swinging his long
legs across country for the sheer de-
light Of walking and Of being out OF
doors. His nose is aquiline, his fore
head is high, and his facial angle is of
the sort that your ethnologist gives
to the most highly developed of Gods
creatures, who walk upon two legs
and win their living from Mother
Earth, not by the sweat of their
brows, but by the keen and judicious
employment of that which lies behind
the brows.
His hair, tossed carelessly back
from his brow, and his beard and the
.l1I ..lm1onstache ot The man whose soul
don't. ltsel|f sen tItye
His mother, Charlotte Hogan, was
a child in arms when her people
brought her from County Glare to the
land of Ireland's promise. His father,
Joseph Schmitz, was by birth a Ger
man.. but of the more restless Teu-
tonic type, emigrating early enough
to be numbered among the Argonauts
who, in seeking to make fortunes in
the new Ell Dorado, made of Ell Do
RADIO q commonwealth that was soon
III 1Or the august company or the SIS
terhood Of states,
The mayor was born In the city
that he was to govern on August %,
1864, and so just AZ years old. His
father, who was before him musician
by nature and by choice, sent him to
the common schools, not neglecting
t ehwhile his sons musical inheri-
tance. Schmitz, the boy, had other
ambitions, and strove for time to-
ward career in another profession.
After two years of medical college his
health failed him, and he left the dis
secting room and the lecture hall for
two years. of rest and convalescene.
His course during the trying days
following the earthquake and the fire
won the admiration of all classes, mil
lionaire and workman, of Governor
Funston and Governor Pardee and
the country at large. He took control
and maintained 1t with a Judgment
and skill that has not once been crit
icised The fiddler mayor has dis
tinctly made good when put up to a
heroic test.