George Christopher

George Christopher (birth name: George Christopheles ; born December 8, 1907 in Arcadia , Greece , † September 14, 2000 in San Francisco ) was an American Republican Party politician who , among other things, was Mayor of San Francisco between 1956 and 1964 and thus was the last mayor appointed by the Republican Party.

Life

George Christopheles immigrated to the USA with his parents James Christopheles and Mary Koines in 1909 when he was two years old and after the death of his father in 1921 as a fourteen-year-old half-orphan. After attending Galileo High School and Humboldt Evening High School , he began studying accounting , which he completed in 1930 with a Bachelor of Science (BS Accounting). After he had simultaneously acquired US citizenship through naturalization in 1930 and changed his family name to Christopher, he worked as an accountant in various companies. He began his political career in 1945 when he was elected a member of the Board of Supervisors , the legislative body of the city government of San Francisco, and served on it until 1956. In 1951 he ran for the first time for the office of mayor of San Francisco , but was defeated by his party friend and incumbent Elmer Robinson .

Four years later, Christopher was elected mayor of San Francisco as a candidate of the Republican Party in 1955 and was able to prevail against the candidate of the Democratic Party , George Reilly, with the largest majority to date . He then took over the office of Elmer Robinson on January 8, 1956. At the beginning of his tenure, the Republican National Convention , the party convention of the Republican Party for the nomination of the presidential and vice-presidential candidates , took place in the Cow Palace in San Francisco in 1956 . He was instrumental in the New York Giants baseball team moving to San Francisco after the 1957 season and playing under the new name San Francisco Giants from 1960 in the newly built Candlestick Park . In 1958 he ran in the Republican primary for the post of US Senator for California , but was defeated by the previous Governor of California , Goodwin Knight .

In 1959, George Christopher was re-elected as Mayor of San Francisco for a second four-year term, this time defeating Democratic candidate Russell L. Wolden. At the Republican National Convention in 1960 he was a delegate and speaker and in 1962 the Republican Party candidate for the post of lieutenant governor of California as running mate of the gubernatorial candidate Richard Nixon , although he lost to incumbent Glenn M. Anderson . After John Shelley of the Democratic Party became the new Mayor of San Francisco on January 8, 1964 , Christopher was the last mayor to be appointed by the Republican Party to this day. On June 8, 1966, he applied in the Republican primary election for the office of governor of California, but lost with 675,683 votes (30.8 percent) clearly against Ronald Reagan , on the 1,417,623 votes (64.62 percent ) of the votes were lost and on November 8, 1966, he finally defeated incumbent Pat Brown (2,749,174 votes, 42.3 percent) with 3,742,913 votes (57.5 percent) .

George Christopher had been married to Tula Sarantitis since 1936 and was buried in the Greek Orthodox Memorial Park in Colma after his death .

Web links

• George Christopher in nndb (English)
• Entry in The Political Graveyard
• Entry in Rulers
• George Christopher in the database of Find a Grave (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ San Francisco: Mayors