Billy Earl Gilmore

 Above: Mature and youthful Gilmore ; Below: Gordon H. Adkins in the news 1980, 1988

Billy Earl Gilmore, June 19, 1946 (Columbus, Miss.) - March 16, 2006 (Las Vegas, Nev.)

VP candidate for People's Party (1988)

Running mate with nominee: Gordon Hallman Adkins Sr. (b. 1936)
Popular vote: 0 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

"God has assured me I will be the next person in the White House in 1989," so declared Presidential candidate Gordon H. Adkins in Feb. 1986, at the same time his brief multiple marriage had come to an end. He was running under the People's Party, which had no connection at all with earlier parties of that name. Adkins said God was also his campaign manager.

He had previously run in 1980 but apparently without a VP. God had informed him on Feb. 13 or 14 (accounts vary) 1980 that Adkins needed to begin his quest for the Presidency. He declared, "God told me I would do greater works than any other man in the history of mankind other than Jesus Christ." As he campaigned a nasty little habit the candidate had developed of writing bad checks for hotel and other services kept cropping up in the news. In Illinois he was handcuffed and led to jail only a month into his 1980 campaign.

Adkins was in fact an ex-convict based in Dallas, Tex. He had served time from June 1981 to Dec. 1984 in Huntsville, Tex. for purchase and resale of oil field equipment involving a $10,000 swindle and bad checks. He had just been released from parole in Oct. 1985. Before that he had been convicted of mail fraud in 1967.

God told him to run again in 1988. His method of addressing voters was to attend services in various churches and then give his electioneering pitch to members of the congregation when testimony time arrived, much to the chagrin of many pastors. Adkins would later claim that by allowing him to speak the ministers were endorsing him, forcing the ministers to go to the media to contradict the story and set the record straight.

His 1988 running mate was announced in 1986. Billy Gilmore, a Las Vegas pastor,  community activist, and  hotel bellhop was described by Adkins thusly, "My choice ... is what some people call a black man. But to me, everyone's the same color. There are just different degrees." The story of how Adkins and Gilmore came to know each other was never revealed. Considering how Adkins had gained "endorsements" from clergy, it does cross the mind that perhaps Gilmore himself was not a willing Vice Presidential nominee.

In Mar. 1986 Adkins was arrested in Oklahoma City when he said he couldn't pay his hotel bill at the Sheraton Century Center Hotel. A ferret that he had with him was placed in an animal shelter. Also in March a hitchhiker he picked up and appointed as a "campaign aide" was captured by immigration agents as an illegal alien. Later in March he was arrested and jailed in Sioux Falls, SD for failure to pay his hotel bill. His response, "I've been arrested because the Devil doesn't want the truth to go forth in Sioux Falls."

In Apr. 1986 he was told to leave the Texas Christian University campus in Fort Worth. Most of June 1986 was spent in jail in Washington DC, once again the consequences of an unpaid hotel bill. Meanwhile he skipped out on showing up in court for his Oklahoma City trial. In Nov. 1986 the court in Sioux City issued a warrant for his arrest since he failed to show up for that court date.

Current news coverage of Adkins, which had been fairly copious for a candidate so obscure, came to a grinding halt at the end of 1986. The reason for this was although no announcement was made, the nominee of the People's Party had fled to Mexico, where he remained until 1992. It seems he also served time in a Mexican prison for financial crimes.

Choice quotes from Adkins:

There is no question about my chances. I will be the next President. God has promised me. It is not my desire to be President but God has called me to this task and He will see it through to a successful finish.

I'm not an independent candidate, but a dependent --  first of all on God and then on my fellow man.

By all measures of reason my running for President is absurd. But so was Christopher Columbus' mission. That was laughable too, wasn't it?

By the way, they laughed at Columbus. And there's a lot of people that have laughed at me. And there's going to be a lot of people who continue to laugh. But they are going to stop laughing at me. The laughter is growing dimmer, quieter, as God elevates me.

All of the issues that confront us in America can be addressed and resolved through applications of faith in the word of God.

It is the goal of the People's Party to cause our nation to return to the laws of God, and the present position of separation of church and state leaves a little bit to be desired.

I hear Him every day. I also hear the voices of other spirits. This morning, God told me to be very sensitive to His lead.

The Lord's Prayer says 'Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven.' The People's Party is a vehicle to usher in the kingdom of Heaven on Earth.

Our country has become a dirty garbage can.

On the deficit: We should cancel out the debts of those who owe us and we'll trust God to take care of the other side of the coin.

On women in government: Women are not to be in authority except over children ... [He also said non-Christians should not hold key government posts]

On women in journalism: I'm not saying that a woman doesn't have creativity, flair, style, expertise. She might be a tremendous writer ... but if there has to be somebody to make a decision from an authority standpoint in dealing with you at this paper, it should be a man.

Psychology is of the Devil.

I can understand that you might think I'm a bit of a kook. But if it [his election] really happens, would you not then really listen pretty seriously to what I say?

America is a greedy country and we created this [Libyan] situation. We're trying to impose our philosophies on other countries.

On Ronald Reagan: I'm not his judge, yet the spirit of God reveals to me the man is a hypocrite. Mr. Reagan lives for a selected few.

On Jimmy Swaggart: We need to tell the country to repent, and we need somebody to do that other than a Jimmy Swaggart, who says do this and send your check to me.

On the major political parties: They are both unrighteous parties, and the reason I say that is that they are partial parties. They are showing partiality. The Republican Party is the party for the rich, while the Democrats say they are the party for the common man. You see? The People's Party is for all the people.

Adkins sometimes hitchhiked, other times was able to fly (frequently in private planes) to destinations in his campaign. The funding was always mysterious, according to the press. VP Gilmore did not seem to be active in the campaign and one wonders what he thought about Adkins' criminal antics. Needless to say the Adkins/Gilmore ticket was not on the ballot in any state and if they had somehow won the election the Presidential nominee's refugee and probable convict status in Mexico at Inauguration time might have posed a Constitutional problem.

After returning to the US from Mexico in 1992, Adkins filed with the FEC in 1994 for a Presidential run in the 1996 election, still using the People's Party as his standard. He was arrested shortly after his filing as a result of numerous outstanding warrants, an action in June 1995 that seems to have ended his third Presidential campaign. Adkins appears to have been married in Dallas in Sept. 1996, arrested in Fort Worth for skipping out on a hotel bill in Nov. 1997,  and then vanishes from history.

Election history: none

Other occupations: US Marine Corps, pastor, bellhop at Las Vegas Hilton, established Friendship Church of God in Christ, Director of Friendship Child Care Center, founder of the Church of God in Christ Prison Ministries (1974-1985), Radio Ministry (1985-1989), member of the Governor Bob Miller Clergy Council (1989), member of the Bureau of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Council.

Buried: Southern Nevada Veterans Memorial Cemetery (Boulder City, Nev.)

Notes:
Moved to Las Vegas as a child in 1953.
Decided to devote his life to religion in 1968

Naomi L. Azulay

Naomi L. Azulay, July 24, 1950 -

VP candidate for Independent (aka New Alliance Party) (1984)

Running mate with nominee: Dennis L. Serrette (b. ca1940)
Popular vote: 2,544 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

Fred Newman (1935-2011) was a Maoist with pretensions of being a psychologist (he wasn't) who had formed a communal movement around 1970 combining Leftist politics with New Age pseudoscience. Within a short time he had temporarily joined forces with Lyndon LaRouche, but personality-driven political parties can only tolerate one guru at a time, so they parted company-- or so it seemed. A possible subsequent Newman-LaRouche connection would forever be a point of conjecture.

From 1975-1978 Newman's group, now called the International Workers Party and claiming allegiance to Marx, Mao, and Lenin, attempted to work with the confederation of organizations and parties that collaborated under the umbrella of the People's Party. In 1976 the People's Party ran the Presidential ticket of Margaret Wright and Benjamin Spock. Apparently Newman and his entourage were shown the door out of the People's Party in 1978 by other progressive activists who held the IWP in low esteem.

In 1979 the New Alliance Party was formed by Newman with Lenora Fulani, who unlike her mentor was a real psychologist. Critics charged that the group was using a technique called "Social Therapy," designed to keep followers in line and manipulated with techniques such as large group awareness training, social isolation, and assignment of party-oriented tasks that were so time consuming there was little room for individual pursuits or critical self-reflection. There were charges that the supposedly defunct International Workers Party was simply operating on an underground basis and involved in secret authoritarian decision-making while using the NAP as a front organization.

Their first Presidential ticket was comprised of African American activist Dennis Serrette and Newman loyalist Nancy Ross. She had the distinction of being the first of Newman's followers to be elected to public office when she successfully gained a seat on the Community School Board 3 in New York City in 1977.

Ross was also head of the "Rainbow Lobby" (the lobbying branch of Newman's "Rainbow Alliance"), an opportunistic and unauthorized variant of the term "Rainbow Coalition" as popularized by the Jackson campaign. Rev. Jesse Jackson himself had co-opted the phrase from earlier more radical political elements. Later Jackson had to clarify that he had nothing to do with the NAP "Rainbow" incarnations.

Lifting the term "Rainbow Alliance," the NAP acted as if was continuing the work of Jackson, who had failed in his attempt to gain the nomination of the Democratic Party. Note Serrette's tactical use of the term "second party"--

We want to get enough votes so someone like Jesse can win in 1988. Let me make it clear. We're not going to win by numbers but by impact. We're starting the embryo of a second party that will express the needs of the people. We are taking up the issues the Democratic party has rejected. We will be out in the streets the day after election day building this second party momentum.

Realizing that many Democrats felt their party had compromised too much and drifted to the Right in order to attract centrist voters, Serrette and Ross attempted to woo this bloc of voters by stating they were upholding the true progressive ideals. "Mondale is not the lesser of two evils," said Ross, "He is the loser of two evils." Their rhetoric was Left of center but somewhat vague on details.

There was a bit of bad press surrounding the running mate question. Dorothy Muns Blancato, an interior decorator and Jazz pianist from Vanport, Penn. was selected as the VP and planned to be listed in three states: Alabama, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Although news reports indicate she was originally intended to be a stand-in candidate, in August 1984 she withdrew from the ticket without informing Serrette first and instead endorsed Sonia Johnson of the Citizens Party. Part of the result of this complicated episode was that Serrette failed to find a place on the Pennsylvania ballot.

Amazingly well funded compared to other Leftist parties, NAP managed to gain ballot positions in DC and 31 states. A very impressive achievement for a first-time national run. Ross was the running mate in all but three states. In Kansas the VP nominee was Naomi L. Azulay. Mississippi and West Virginia voters found a blank spot in the VP slot with Serrette where other parties included the name of the running mate.

Naomi Azulay was a New York-based campaign worker for NAP when she was used as a probable stand-in candidate for VP in Kansas. An April 1984 news account found her gathering nominating petition signatures in South Dakota, where the reporter said she had been for almost a month. As it turned out, South Dakota gave the NAP the highest percentage of their popular vote of any state in 1984 so she must have been a pretty effective volunteer.

The Serrette/Azulay ticket finished with 0.25% of the vote in Kansas, placing 5th out of 6. It was the 4th highest percentage the NAP won when compared to their other states. If elected Azulay would not have been to able take office since she was just barely under the Constitutionally required of 35 at the time.

Serrette broke with the NAP shortly after the election. In a scathing article written in 1988, he concluded with:

These few pages offer but an overview of a complex, and, in my opinion, dangerous organization. Dangerous, not only to the innocent, well-intentioned people who are caught in its grasp, but to the many it will try to exploit. Dangerous, because it uses a very progressive line, and untold millions of dollars, to prey on black communities, to attack black leaders and institutions, and to assault progressive organizations at whim. Dangerous because it can lie outright— lie about being black-led when blacks do not sit on the top, do not control the resources, do not control personnel; lie to its members about its participation with LaRouche; lie about Charles Tisdale; lie about me; lie about whatever serves Newman's interests, and put forth spokespersons who come to believe these lies. Dangerous because many members will do whatever they are told to do without ever evaluating what they have been told.

In conclusion, while I believe it is important that NAP be exposed for what it truly is, it is our job not to dwell on the organization, which craves controversy, but to concentrate our energies in our communities and organize, organize, organize. It is a vacuum that has been left open that allows NAP and other oppressive organizations to abuse our communities. We must fill that vacuum with genuinely pro­gressive, community-controlled organizations.

Meanwhile, Fred Newman has been recognized by the Cult Education Institute as a historical cult figure and leader.

Election history:
1982 - New York City Council (Democratic) - primary - defeated
1982 - New York City Council (New Alliance Party) - defeated

Other occupations: physical therapist, activist with Committee for a Unified Independent Party, Texas coordinator for the New Alliance Party in 1988

Notes:
Later registered with the Independence Party of New York.

Julius Wilson Hobson

Julius Wilson Hobson, May 29, 1919 (Birmingham, Ala.) – March 23, 1977 (Washington, D.C.)

VP candidate for People's Party (aka Liberty Union Party aka Peace and Freedom Party aka Independent aka New Party aka Common Good Party aka Human Rights Party) (1972)

Running mate with nominee: Benjamin McLane Spock (1903–1998)
Popular vote: 78,759 (0.10%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

The People's Party was an attempt to form an umbrella political party for the far Left. It was comprised of elements from the Peace and Freedom Party (Calif, Idaho, Ind.), Liberty Union Party (Vt.), Common Good Party (NY), Human Rights Party (Mich., Utah), and the New Party.

The New Party attempted to draft consumer advocate Ralph Nader for President, but he refused to run that year. The Peace and Freedom Party, now mostly centered in California, joined the coalition to form the People's Party. Michigan's Human Rights Party declined to place Dr. Spock's name on the ballot in deference to Sen. McGovern. Efforts to place Spock on the ballot in New York and Utah came to nothing.

After seriously considering backing the nomination of US Sen. George McGovern (D-SD), the Party chose to nominate Dr. Benjamin Spock, with Julius W. Hobson as his running mate. Dr. Spock stated he was merely a stand-in candidate and would gladly step down if someone else with more stature such as Rep. Shirley Chisholm agreed to run in his place.

Hobson, who by 1972 was something of a political gadfly, had evolved into an increasingly militant activist to battle various manifestations of segregation in Washington, DC using original and effective tactics on the streets, in court, and serving in public office. The man had a unique blend of being part political theater showman and part researcher. In 1971 he was given just six months to live as a result of multiple myeloma, a cancer of the spine, but fooled everyone by surviving until 1977 although he eventually was restricted to a wheelchair. In at least one photo from the 1972 campaign Hobson can be seen using crutches.

The platform, according to the New York Times, included "immediate withdrawal of all American troops abroad; free medical care as a right; an end to tax preference; an allowance of $6,500 for a family of four; the legalization of abortion on demand and marijuana, and an end to discrimination against women and homosexuals." Unfortunately for the People's Party the Democratic Party nomination of McGovern, easily the most Leftist candidate that party has offered since FDR, absorbed a group of voters who otherwise would have supported Spock if someone like Hubert Humphrey or Henry "Scoop" Jackson had been chosen instead.

On the ballot in ten states the Spock/Hobson ticket finished strongest in California 0.66%, Vermont 0.54%, Idaho 0.29%, and Colorado 0.25%.

Election history:
1968-1969 - District of Columbia Board of Education
1969 - District of Columbia Board of Education - defeated
1971 - US House of Representatives Delegate (DC Statehood Party) - defeated
1975-1977 - Council of the District of Columbia (DC Statehood Party)

Other occupations: custodian, paper company worker, soldier (WWII), Library of Congress researcher, Social Security Administration economist and statistician, teacher, Chair of the District of Columbia’s chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), founder of Association Community Teams (ACT), author

Buried: ?

Notes:
Some sources give his year of birth as 1922
"For 25 hell-raising years, Mr. Hobson shook Washington in unorthodox, unpredictable ways. As
  often as not, he was the lone front-line fighter against some aspect of racial discrimination, the
 gruff-and-ready tickler for equal education. He was always fast with an irreverent quip, and he never
 let up on his lawsuits, his books, his thorough research, his provocative political activities and his
 extraordinary ability to intimidate, embarrass or fool officialdom into doing something about civil
 rights."--Washington Post obituary.
In 1981 the Washington Post revealed that Hobson had been a paid informer for the FBI in the 1960s.
 Many of his supporters suspect he was playing a game of supplying misinformation or using the
 Bureau to thwart his enemies.
In Vermont in 1972 Bernie Sanders was downticket running for Governor also as part of the Liberty Union slate.

Benjamin McLane Spock

Benjamin McLane Spock, May 2, 1903 (New Haven, Conn.) – March 15, 1998 (La Jolla, Calif.)

VP candidate for National Conference for a New Politics (1968)
VP candidate for Peace and Freedom Party (1968)
VP candidate for People's Party (1976)

Running mate with nominee (1968): Martin Luther King (1929-1968)
Running mate with nominee (1968): Dick Gregory (1932-2017)
Running mate with nominee (1976): Margaret Nusom Wright (1922-1996)
Popular vote (1968): 1680 (0.00%)
Popular vote (1976): 49,016 (0.06%)
Electoral vote (1968, 1976): 0/538

The campaign (1968):

In early 1967 several Leftist activists had been attempting to convince Rev. Martin Luther King of making a run for President in 1968. In August 1967 at a convention held by a loose alliance of progressive and civil rights groups called the National Conference for a New Politics, Rev. King and Dr. Benjamin Spock were nominated as a Presidential ticket. The group never met again. King refused to fully embrace the electioneering idea and was assassinated before any effort could be seriously pursued.

Meanwhile, after his unsuccessful run for Mayor of Chicago in 1967 as an independent, comedian and activist Dick Gregory wanted another try at elected office and decided to run for President as an outsider. As he said in an interview during the 1968 campaign, "I feel the two-party system is obsolete. The two-party system is so corrupt and immoral that it cannot solve the problems confronting the masses of people in this country. I did agree to accept the nomination in various states from independent organizations who had already had a position on the ballot and this why I have accepted."

Gregory ran in several states as a write-in or sometimes showed up on the ballot itself, under the banner of multiple political parties, with various running mates. No matter what the platform of the party he was using as a vehicle, Dick Gregory was still Dick Gregory.

When the newly created Peace and Freedom Party held their first chaotic convention, Dick Gregory was outvoted in the nomination process by Black Panther Party leader Eldridge Cleaver. In Pennsylvania and Virginia, Gregory was run under the Peace and Freedom Party banner anyway, with anti-war Dr. Benjamin Spock as his running mate. Spock managed to withdraw from the Pennsylvania ticket, replaced by Mark Lane. This left Virginia as the only state where this team was presented and Spock was considered a "stand-in" until someone else came along. But someone else did not come along.

Before Dr. Spock became known as a Leftist activist, he was already a celebrity as the author of the national best-seller Baby and Child Care (1946). The book came back to haunt him during the Youth Rebellion of the late 1960s/early 1970s, with many on the conservative side blaming Spock's promotion of "permissiveness" as one of the causes of the Generation Gap. Spock regarded these attacks as ad hominem and groundless.

The Gregory campaign placed 5th nationally (outpolling Cleaver) with 47,149 popular votes (0.06%). The Gregory/Spock ticket earned 1680 (0.12%) popular votes in Virginia.

The campaign (1976):

The People's Party was a confederation of minor parties, mostly local. In 1976 those parties included the Peace and Freedom Party (Calif.), Human Rights Party (Mich.), Vermont Liberty Union, and the Bicentennial Reality Party (Wash.)

The Presidential nominee was Margaret Wright, who was radicalized during union activity as a "Rosie the Riveter" worker for Lockheed during WWII. She later became a civil rights activist and by the late 1960s was the Black Panther Party Minister of Education. In 1976 the People's Party nominated Wright for President and Gray Panthers founder Maggie Kuhn (1905-1995), an activist for seniors, as her running mate. Kuhn declined, so the 1972 People's Party Presidential nominee, Dr. Benjamin Spock was selected as the replacement Vice-Presidential choice.

Wright scraped up enough money to make campaign visits in her old Ford station wagon. The ticket was on the ballot in six states. Wright wanted to be on the ballot in the Green Mountain State under the banner of the the Vermont Liberty Union Party (which was running Bernie Sanders for Governor in 1976) but could not file for want of the $1000 fee required.

The final popular vote results for the Wright/Spock ticket: California (Peace and Freedom Party) 0.53%, Michigan (Human Rights Party) 0.10%, Washington (Bicentennial Reality Party) 0.07%, Wisconsin (Independent) 0.04%, Minnesota and New Jersey (both People's Party) 0.03% each. California provided 41,731 of their national 49,016 tally.

Election history:
1968 - Peace and Freedom Party nomination for US President - defeated
1968 - Freedom and Peace Party nomination for US President - withdrew
1972 - Democratic Party nomination for US Vice-President - defeated
1972 - Liberal Party nomination for US President - defeated
1972 - US President (People's Party) - defeated
1980 - Peace and Freedom Party nomination for US President - defeated

Other occupations: doctor, author, honorary co-chair (with Gore Vidal) of the New Party.

Buried: Seaview Cemetery (Rockport, Maine)

Notes:
I am told I was raised by the precepts of Spock's book and here I am running a blog about third party Vice-Presidential candidates so obviously I turned out quite normal.

Samuel Wardell Williams

Samuel Wardell Williams, February 7, 1851 (Mount Carmel, Ill.) – August 5, 1913 (Vicennes, Ind.)

VP candidate for People's Party (aka Populist Party) (1908)

Running mate with nominee: Thomas E. Watson (1856-1922)
Popular vote: 28,862 (0.19%)
Electoral vote: 0/483

The campaign:

The Populist platform was indeed radical in 1896, but this was 1908 in the "Progressive Era" and nearly every party had appropriated the People's Party ideas. This was the final national campaign for what was once one of the most powerhouse third parties in US history. It was also the final campaign for William Jennings Bryan.

1908 running mate Samuel Williams was one of the Populist voices in 1896 that warned it would be a mistake to totally endorse Bryan and he agitated for Watson to be the hybrid running mate in that election. Now Williams himself was the running mate.

Watson's growing racist and religious bigotry was not apparent in the People's Party literature. The articulate Judge Williams actually wrote some of their material.

The Watson/Williams ticket recorded votes in 16 states. They tallied 12.59% in Watson's home state of Georgia, 3.94% in Florida, 1.91% in Mississippi, and 1.50% in Alabama. After that it quickly dwindles down until you reach one single vote in Maine.

Election history:
1877 - Mayor of Vicennes, Ind. (Democratic) - defeated
1882-1886 - Indiana House of Representatives (Democratic)
1904 - People's Party nomination for US President - defeated

Other occupations: judge, attorney, Deputy County Clerk of Wasbash County (Ill.), bookkeeper, salesman, Prosecuting Attorney of Knox County, Ind. 1878-1880 

Buried: Greenlawn Cemetery (Vicennes, Ind.)

Notes:
Died from appendicitis
Moved to Vicennes, Ind. in 1869-1870.
Episcopalian
Originally studied to be a Presbyterian minister
Apparently never married.
Once a loyal Democrat, he was driven to the People's Party as a result of his disapproval of President
 Cleveland's first term.

Thomas Henry Tibbles

Thomas Henry Tibbles, May 22, 1840 (Washington County, Ohio) – May 14, 1928 (Omaha, Neb.)

VP candidate for People's Party (aka Populist Party) (1904)

Running mate with nominee: Thomas E. Watson (1856-1922)
Popular vote: 114,070 (0.84%)   
Electoral vote: 0/476

The campaign:

The People's Party was reorganized, with the result being it was serving as a political vehicle for Thomas Watson, the VP running mate from 1896. Watson's running mate was Thomas H. Tibbles which seemed an unlikely alliance since Tibbles had a strong record of abolitionist activity and championing Native American rights while Watson was becoming increasingly xenophobic and promoting white supremacy.

Most of the old Populists had joined one of the major parties, which were co-opting policies originally proposed by the People's Party. William Jennings Bryan himself said that a vote for the Watson/Tibbles ticket was a vote for Theodore Roosevelt.

In Spokane, Wash. Tibbles predicted a financial crash by 1906. He was slightly off, the brief Panic of 1907 took place three years later.

Although their final poll numbers were dismal the Watson/Tibbles ticket did well in their home states. In Georgia they almost placed second with 17.28%, and Nebraska they finished third with 9.09%. Other states where they made respectable percentages for a third party: Alabama (4.64%), Florida (4.15%), Texas (3.45%), Nevada (2.84%), Mississippi (2.55%), and Montana (2.36%).

Election history: none.

Other occupations: author, journalist, Native American rights activist, Methodist preacher, farmer, novelist

Buried: Bellevue Cemetery (Bellevue, Neb.)

Notes:
As a teenager was one of John Brown's group under the command of James Henry Lane in Bleeding
 Kansas. Was captured, sentenced to hang, but escaped.
In his role as a journalist he brought special attention to the case of Standing Bear, also to the
 massacre at Wounded Knee.
Married Susette "Bright Eyes" LaFlesche.
His family moved to Illinois in 1845.
Tibbles' book Buckskin and Blanket Days was read by Louis L'Amour in 1958.

Ignatius Loyola Donnelly

 Donnelly's map of Atlantis

 

Donnelly's vision of 1988

Ignatius Loyola Donnelly, November 3, 1831 (Philadelphia, Penn.) – January 1, 1901 (Minneapolis, Minn.)

VP candidate for People's Party (aka Populist Party aka Middle of the Road Populists) (1900)

Running mate with nominee: Wharton Barker (1846-1921)
Popular vote: 50,989 (0.36%)           
Electoral vote: 0/447

The campaign:

1900 was a McKinley-Bryan replay and once again the People's Party had to make a decision whether or not to endorse Bryan. The Great Commoner would indeed snag the endorsement of the Anti-Imperialist Party, but the Populists were not so unanimous.

The pro-fusion forces of the People's Party initially endorsed Bryan and as they did in 1896 nominated their own Vice-Presidential candidate Charles Towne. However, Towne withdrew once Bryan selected Adlai Stevenson as his Democratic running mate.

The anti-fusion faction (also known as the "Middle of the Road Populists"), which was representing an increasingly dwindling portion of the People's Party, struck out on their own nominating Barker and Donnelly.

Ignatius Loyola Donnelly is easily one of the most unusual and interesting characters profiled in this blog so far. This brief format does not really give his colorful career any justice.

The Populist platform for 1900 included support for a graduated income tax, government ownership of railroads, opposition to American imperialism in the Philippines and Puerto Rico, support limiting immigration of Japanese, Mongolian and Malayan workers, support public ownership of utilities, support direct voting, and in favor of home rule for the District of Columbia and the territories.

They were on the ballot in 27 states with their best showing in Texas at 4.95%. Their strongest region was in the Deep South. They didn't appear to be spoilers or cost Bryan any states although he lost on his own anyway. Nationally the People's Party placed a very distant 5th place and would continue to fade away as many of their issues would eventually be co-opted.

Election history:
1857 - Minnesota Territorial Senate (Republican) - defeated
1858 - Minnesota Territorial Senate (Republican) - defeated
1858 - Dakota County Commissioner (Minn.)
1860-1863 - Lt. Governor of Minnesota (Republican)
1862-1869 - US House of Representatives (Minn.) (Republican/Union/Republican)
1868 - US House of Representatives (Minn.) (Independent Republican) - defeated
1869 - Republican nomination for US Senate (Minn.) (Republican) - defeated
1870 - US House of Representatives (Minn.) (Democratic) - defeated
1874-1879 - Minnesota State Senate (Anti-Monopolist Party/Greenback Party/Democratic)
1876 - US House of Representatives (Minn.) (Greenback Party) - defeated
1878 - US House of Representatives (Minn.) (Democratic/Greenback Party) - defeated
1884 - US House of Representatives (Minn.) (Democratic) - defeated
1887-1889 - Minnesota House of Representatives (Independent)
1890-1895 - Minnesota State Senate (Alliance/People's Party)
1892 - Governor of Minnesota (People's Party) - defeated
1894 - Minnesota State Senate (People's Party) - defeated
1897-1898 - Minnesota House of Representatives (People's Party)
1900 - Populist Party nomination for US President - defeated
1900 - Union Reform Party nomination for US President - defeated

Other occupations: attorney, author, novelist, poet, real estate developer, newspaper editor, Liaison officer (Dakota War of 1862)

Buried: Calvary Cemetery (Saint Paul, Minn.)

Notes:
His father was an Irish immigrant.
Left the Catholic Church in the 1850s.
Was a partner in developing the utopian community of Nininger City but it failed.
Buried in the same cemetery as Kaaren Verne, Peter Lorre's second wife.
He wrote Atlantis: The Antediluvian World in 1882, which influenced Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and

  in turn the Nazis own mythology and Donnelly also helped spark the revival that led the modern

  New Age belief that Atlantis once existed as a sophisticated civilization.
He wrote Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel in 1883, which is said to have influenced Immanuel

  Velikovsky's Worlds in Collision (1950)
He wrote The Great Cryptogram in 1888, where he revealed himself as part of the Baconian school

  of thought regarding the authorship of works attributed to William Shakespeare.
Under the name "Edmund Boisgilbert, M.D." he wrote Caesar's Column: A Story of the Twentieth

  Century in 1890 which is a dystopian novel set in the year 1988.
In 1857 left the Democratic Party for the Republican Party due to his aversion to slavery.
Campaigned for the Liberal Republican ticket in 1872.
If elected he would not have lived long enough to be sworn as he died of a heart attack New Year's

  Day 1901.
When accused by Rep. Elihu Washburne (Ill.) of taking bribes from railroad corporations, Donnelly

  gave a foul-nouthed reply on the floor of the House that essentially ended his career in Congress and

  included "If there be one character which, while blotched and spotted all over, yet raves and rants

  and blackguards like a prostitute; if there be one bold, bad, empty bellowing demagogue, it is the

  gentleman from Illinois.”
Was known by his contemporaries as the "Sage of Nininger" and also "The Prince of Cranks."