The Wizard of Oz and Long Beach

The year was 1905 and Long Beach was experiencing what local press called a “reign of terror.” Several public officials had their homes fire-bombed. The mayor, Rufus Eno, told reporters that his house had been doused with oil and that he had been personally threatened with a note stating someone would disfigure him.

The fires and stories of threats were a distraction from the fact that major bribing was going on inside City Hall. Seems like the mayor and another member of the Board of Trustees (the name before it was a City Council) took a bribe in City Hall from a contractor. The trustee was arrested, and the mayor resigned only after he learned he would face a candidate from the “Good Government” party.

Facing an April election and all the bad press he was receiving was too much for Eno who had his business associate deliver to the Board of Trustees in closed session, the following note:

“Gentlemen: Realizing that an election of officers for the City of Long Beach will be held during the coming April and that the city is entering upon an era of unprecedented prosperity, I feel that the question of who shall govern its affairs is of grave and great importance, and my interests are entirely with this city and its people. Therefore, without preference as to which party shall take up the reins of government, I deem it my duty as a member of said board as well as one of its citizens to give the people of Long beach an untrammeled opportunity to say who shall constitute and direct its affairs. Therefore, I hereby tender my signature as a member of the Board of Trustees of Long Beach, Cal., effective as soon as my successor shall have been appointed and qualified and earnestly request that the same be complied with in plenty of time to give all good citizens an opportunity to voice their sentiments at the coming election.

Very respectfully, R.A. Eno.”

The council didn’t have to look too far for a suitable candidate to fill Eno’s vacancy. Sitting in the wings was a citizen who had served through the ranks during the Civil War – starting as a private and then retiring as a Colonel: Samuel Merrill.

Samuel Merrill was originally from Indiana and ran the Bowen-Merrill publishing house he had inherited from his father. His book on his experience in the Seventieth Indiana Volunteer Infantry was published by his company. It was the same publishing house that would publish “The Wizard of Oz.” Merrill ran the company until President Benjamin Harrison appointed him as U.S. Consul General at Calcutta. He stayed there and moved to Long Beach in 1902.

The city website lists Merrill as the person who became mayor after Eno. But press accounts in the Los Angeles Times Feb. 27, 1906 edition, state that the resignation was accepted by a motion of the trustees and Merrill was “sent for and accepted the trust and was sworn in as City Trustee to serve until the April election.” Merrill was not selected as “president of the board” but instead, Eno’s business associate and member of the board – D.M. Cate – was selected and “the meeting adjourned.”

Merrill and Cate ran for re-election on the “Good Government Party” ticket against the “Independents” and lost. Merrill retired from public life but kept very active until his death commanding the Great Army of the Republic organization.

 gerrie@beachcomber.news