James Michael Curley is elected mayor of Boston.

Curley (D), with 43,262 votes, defeats Thomas Kenny (D) of South Boston, with 37,522, to win the first of his four terms in office. Inaugurated on February 1, 1914, Curley establishes a credit union for municipal employees, and raises the pay for municipal scrubwomen and gives them mops to get them up off their knees. Subsequently called the “Mayor of the Poor,” Curley creates job-producing public works projects that build roads, bridges, beaches, municipal buildings, neighborhood health clinics, and rebuilds Boston City Hospital. He also antagonizes the Yankee business establishment. Thomas O’Connor subsequently writes that Curley ignored both ward bosses and business leaders, “claiming the people as his only constituency.” Curley moves to 350 Jamaicaway in 1915,* and is again elected mayor in 1921,* 1929,* and 1945.*