"Best Governed City in the U.S."
 
In May of 1936, 20 years after he took office, Mayor Dan Hoan appeared on the cover of Time Magazine. The magazine called Hoan "one of the nation's ablest public servants, and, under him, Milwaukee has become perhaps the best governed city in the U.S."
As bleak as the thirties were for Milwaukee, its municipal government shone during the Depression. The city started its own work relief programs as well as made creative use of the money it was getting from the federal government. Milwaukee developed an excellent public park system, built libraries and social centers and started recreational programs. The city won some awards for public health during the 1930's.

Mayor Hoan made sure he gave plenty of credit to the Socialist Party, which was beginning to experience setbacks by the mid-thirties. For one thing, workers and populists had more choices. Some aligned themselves with the Communist Party, others joined up with the Progressive Party and President Roosevelt' s Democratic Party. The last four years of Dan Hoan's tenure as mayor were not easy for him. He was facing aldermen who were not receptive to his ideas. In the election of 1940, he faced Carl Zeidler, a challenger who didn't appear to have much of an ideology at all. Zeidler was young, out-going and dynamic. Milwaukee was apparently ready for a change and chose Zeidler as its next mayor. But the Hoan era was definitely a high point in Milwaukee's political history.


Time Line

1674 to 1840
Native Milwaukeeans
The French
The Founders

1840 to 1865
The Bridge War
A City Joined
The Germans
BEER
Wheat

1865 to 1900
Growth
Steel & Iron
Workers vs. Owners
The Poles

1900 to 1920
Socialist Era Begins
Mayor Dan Hoan
WWI Anti-Germanism

1920 to 1950
Prohibition
The Depression
"Best Governed City in the U.S."
World War II

1950 to 2003
Growing Pains
Civil Rights
Urban Renewel
Braves & Brewers
 

CONTACT