Thomas Michael Whalen III

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Thomas M. Whalen III (1993)

Thomas Michael Whalen III (born January 6, 1934 in Albany , New York , † March 4, 2002 near Feura Bush , Albany County , New York ) was an American lawyer and politician of the Democratic Party . He was the 73rd Mayor of Albany from May 28, 1983 to December 31, 1993.

Life

Thomas Michael Whalen III was born in Albany in 1934 and grew up in a Catholic family. He was of Irish descent. He attended the Vincentian Institute in Albany and later Manhattan College , which he graduated in 1955. Whalen then studied law at Albany Law School . After graduating there, he worked as a lawyer for the law firm Cooper Erving & Savage in Albany. In the 1960s, Whalen joined the Democratic Party. Between 1969 and 1975 he was a magistrate in Albany; thereafter he was among other things chairman of the University Council of the State University of New York .

In 1981, Whalen became chairman of the Albany Common Council under Mayor Erastus Corning . After Corning's death on May 28, 1983, Whalen became the new mayor of Albany under Corning's re-election agreement. In his new office, Whalen campaigned for better financial controls and a strengthening of the local economy. The city had to contend with a sharp decline in population and a high number of job losses in the 1980s. In 1985 Thomas Whalen was re-elected as mayor and was re-elected in 1989. In 1988 he received the Financial Leadership Award from the United States Conference of Mayors. Whalen is credited with a large number of reforms in the city council, including a reduction in political influence on urban development. On December 31, 1993 Whalen resigned as mayor, he was replaced by Gerald Jennings . After his political career, Whalen went back to work as a lawyer.

Thomas Whalen was married to Denis Marie O'Connor from 1960 and had four sons and a daughter. He died on March 4, 2002 at the age of 68 in a car accident on New York State Route 32 south of Albany.

Individual evidence

  1. a b Eric Pace: Thomas M. Whalen III, 68, Three-Term Mayor of Albany. New York Times , March 8, 2002, accessed July 13, 2019.