Kansas City’s 19th century mystery mayor: Alexander L. Harris

By Diane Euston

Leadership in our city has been commanded by a mayor elected by citizens of Kansas City since 1853, and since 1925, the mayor’s power has been somewhat limited due to switching to a council-manager government structure where the city council appoints a city manager to run day-to-day operations.

Prior to this time, the mayor had control of the operations of the city, and the men who originally were appointed mayor were elected due in part to their stance in society.

Campaigning was limited; there were no political yard signs or major debates before an election- and mayors early-on served a term of one year.

Kansas City prior to the Civil War only stretched south to 20th Street and ended east, for the most part, at Lydia Avenue. The area was fractured during the war, and growth was nonexistent. Most of the city’s leaders were pro-Southerners forced to tamper their convictions in order to ensure that business ventures continued.

Talks of getting the railroad to Kansas City began well before the Civil War, and leaders were aware that whichever city could convince the railroads to choose them as a hub- with

Leavenworth and St. Joseph in the mix- would be the future of commerce for the surrounding area.

Picking up the pieces post-war would prove to be directly connected to the future prominence of Kansas City. One mayor – very much forgotten over the test of time – was at the helm of this reboot of the city. His time in Kansas City, although brief, greatly affected the city’s growth well after he left for the west.

Piecing Together His Life before K.C.

Born in 1820 in Missouri, Alexander Lancaster Harris didn’t leave a biography or detailed record of where he came from, and for this very reason, part of his life remains a bit of a mystery. His parents are unknown, and where he spent his early life isn’t clear.

Harris may have grown up just south of St. Louis in Washington County. In 1847, Alex married 18-year-old Cordelia Amanda Chandler at the City Hotel in Hazel Green, Wis. Cordelia’s father, John Jones Chandler was “a distinguished soldier in the War of 1812” who settled in Troy, Mo. before 1825 and was one of the city’s early leaders. Sixty miles northeast of St. Louis, the small community where Cordelia grew up, was a far cry from St. Louis, but her father’s job working with leather goods would have kept her off a farm and in town.

The couple settled in Galena, Ill. where Alex worked as a saloon keeper. They welcomed three daughters: Pauline (b. 1848), Fannie (b. 1850) and Kate (b. 1853). Likely for better business prospects and closer access to their extended families, the Harrises moved to St. Louis, Mo. by 1854. Alex operated a saloon on Market Street until 1857.

After the birth of his fourth daughter, Kate, in 1857, the family opted to abandon their brief life in St. Louis and take a gamble in the growing hamlet of Kansas City. Although their motives remain unclear, this decision would greatly influence their futures – and the future of the western Missouri town.

Paving His Way to Mayorship

Described as a “dapper, active little man,” Alexander Lancaster Harris arrived on the levee in Kansas City with his future on the line. The newspaper later recalled, “He had little to begin business on. He had neither influential acquaintances nor money, only pluck and determination to win his way in the world.” Despite the new location and unfamiliar surroundings, Alex went straight back to what he knew.

He knew the liquor business.

Alex opted to open a saloon not far from the levee where steamboats landed often during the day. Historian and physician Theodore S. Case wrote, “When I came here in 1857 [Harris] conducted a saloon on the levee on Main Street, three or four doors from the river. In those days he resided over the saloon.”

Even though he was new to the town, he quickly went to work with its future in mind. One matter of importance to the citizens of the city was developing a public school system. Although there were country schools organized with subscriptions paid to have students attend, an organization within the city limits was far from happening.

The matter was one of importance. The Kansas City Weekly Journal wrote in August 1860, “The first thing to be done, then, is for the whole area of the city corporation to be placed under the city authorities for school purposes – Those authorities, or an independent board of education, to adopt a school system, and control it after it is adopted.”

Alex had only been in the city three years when he was elected to serve on the city council in the First Ward, and the matter of a modern school system was at the forefront of his mind. He headed a newly created Council Committee on Schools, and the Journal reported, “He had petitions in circulation, and they were receiving the signatures of everyone to whom they were presented, praying the County Court to set apart the corporation of Kansas City as one School District, to be under the control of a select Board of Education.”

The effort was valiant but unsuccessful. Although Harris served on this committee for two years, the mayor refused to act, possibly sidelined by the outbreak of the Civil War.

Alex’s wife, Cordelia, was known to be helpful to neighbors, especially during the strife of the Civil War. “She more than once showed herself to be truly the daughter of a soldier,” the newspaper reported.

Alex’s active role in local politics and as a leading Democrat led him to branch out past his role as a saloon keeper. By 1859, he moved his family to a small frame home at 4th and Cherry that he later enlarged into a two story brick home that was one of the finest homes in the city.

Mayor During Strife

In April 1866, Alex became the city’s ninth mayor when he was elected to the office. The role came at a seriously important time of growth for Kansas City. If the proper actions weren’t taken, the city would lose contracts that would directly impact whether the city would be a significant metropolitan city in the middle of America.

During his first term, Congress approved a contract that city leaders had been working on for just shy of ten years. The bid to build the Hannibal Bridge – the first bridge spanning over the Missouri River- was approved. Kansas City would get the railroad, and in turn, would become a hub of activity.

In addition to securing this, Mayor Harris also approved a charter for a gas works, and the state legislature approved the measure. Kansas City would have lights.

Despite these successes, there were some unhealed wounds from the Civil War that reared their ugly heads during his term, and the ability to maintain law and order in the city was paramount. If residents didn’t feel safe, they wouldn’t likely stay.

In July 1866, Major Wyllys Ransom, clerk of the circuit court, was heading home when a group of “five bushwhackers on horseback” approached him on the street at 7th and Main.
One of the bushwhackers drew up his gun and shot Ransom through the nose, grazed his cheek and shot him through his leg. The violence was tied to the war, as Ransom was a soldier in the 6th Kansas Calvary, and these men who attacked him planned to settle an old score from the war.

Mayor Harris wasted no time condemning the action and putting a rather severe proclamation on the books. Kansas City resembled more of the Wild West than an eastern city at the time, but he was willing to take no chances. The proclamation warned “all persons within the limits of the city against carrying about their persons, any fire-arms, or other deadly weapon, within the meaning of the law. Any one found violating the law in this respect, will be immediately arrested and punished.”

One project Mayor Harris was most passionate about seeing through was the creation of the public school system and an independent-operating Board of Education. In his term, the establishment of a public school system was completed.

Democrat A.L. Harris wasn’t re-elected mayor in April 1867; to the dismay of most of the city government, a Radical Republican named Edward H. Allen won the election. Instead of walking away quietly, Alex continued to work in order to see that the board meetings by the Board of Education continued under new leadership; in March 1867, this happened for the first time.

Public schools opened “in rented rooms that have been hastily and scantily furnished.” A superintendent and 17 teachers were furnished to educate the 2,150 children living within the city limits.

Slowing Down in Public Service

Tragedy struck Alex when his youngest child and only son, five-year-old Alexander Lancaster Harris, Jr. died from pneumonia in December 1867.

Kansas City remained divided on politics, but the one term of Edward H. Allen was enough for the majority of the city. Alexander was able to win a second term in April 1868 by about 100 votes over his opponent.

In his second term, the first public school building erected for that purpose was opened– Washington School at the corner of Independence Avenue and Cherry Streets. An additional two schools were also opened during his second term.

In 1869, the Hannibal Bridge was opened and the railroad had finally arrived. With it came new growing pains for Kansas City. By the following year, there was a housing shortage; the population had reached over 32,000 people — an increase of over seven times that of just ten years earlier.

In 1870, Alex was elected as sheriff, and in 1873, there was a public outcry for him to run for court judge. He responded in a letter to the newspaper. “As I regard the situation of our country, and especially of our city, we are about entering upon the most difficult period likely to occur in our growth from a village up to that of a great city,” he wrote to the Journal. “Cheap lands and a consequent immigration, with capital to disburse annually, as heretofore, with other kindred appliances, may be sufficient to ensure the prosperity of a small town in a new country, but it must be apparent to all that our rapid growth towards the conditions and requirements of a great city renders reorganization looking to greater productions at home absolutely indispensable.”

Regardless of his reluctance to put his name on the ticket as a judge, he accepted and won the office for three terms.

Looking out West for Further Prosperity

His children were growing older and marrying off to well-respected families. His oldest daughter, Pauline, married Confederate chief of staff to Brig. Gen. John S. Marmaduke, John Courtney Moore. He was one of the founders of the Kansas City Times. One daughter, Kate, remained single and worked as a public school teacher.

Despite Alex’s keen insight on the future of Kansas City and his willingness to be one of its leaders, he was drawn to move further west to seek out his next adventure. Possibly enticed by silver mining prospects, Alex sold his home in Kansas City, gathered up his family and moved to Colorado.

For a time, he settled in Denver, but a purchase of mining operations in Howardsville near Silverton had his dreams of retirement and relaxation put on hold.

Created by the railroads in 1880, the town of Durango in southwestern Colorado was the perfect place for Alex in his semi-retirement. The discovery of silver in the nearby mountains, the railroad operation, and a good supply of water and coal made it an ideal location.

Perhaps the people of Durango got wind of Alex’s impressive background. By 1895, he reprised his role from Kansas City and was elected mayor of Durango. Despite the fact that he was reportedly growing blind in his advanced age of 75, the community had grown to trust him and his instincts.

Kansas City Was Always Home

Because he still had one daughter living in Kansas City, Alex would often return to visit his friends. Cordelia would spend many winter seasons back in Kansas City while her husband tended to his business interests in Colorado.

While back visiting in the early spring of 1898, Cordelia grew very sick and weak at her daughter’s home at 711 Forest. Without delay, the family telegraphed Alex who jumped on the train and returned to Kansas City.

On March 8, 1898, Cordelia took her last breath with her husband and family by her side. She was buried next to her five-year-old son at Union Cemetery. “Mrs. Harris was very domestic in her habits, and paid little attention, even in the war times, to anything except the welfare of her family,” the Kansas City Times wrote. “Possessed of a bright intellect, she was endowed with all the traits that go to make up a charming woman.”

Alexander Lancaster Harris did what he always did. He turned back to his business interests that had worked for decades to support his family. With his daughter Kate in tow, he returned to Durango.

Just over five months later, Alex came down with pneumonia after visiting his mining interests on Red Mountain where work on a new mine was set to begin.

On August 27, 1898, he passed away inside his home in Durango. The newspapers in Colorado hailed him as “one of the highest-respected citizens of southwestern Colorado.”

His lifeless body was prepared in a coffin and loaded into a train from Durango back to Kansas City for burial next to his young son and wife.

Kansas City physician, community leader and early historian Theodore Case addressed a crowd of Kansas Citians days after his death. In a booming voice, he declared, “About two years ago, Mr. Harris was here on a visit and was quite feeble and almost blind. He could hardly realize the marvelous growth Kansas City had undergone since the time of his departure, but, nevertheless, enjoyed himself immensely in viewing the city with friends of ye olden time. Mr. Harris was a progressive and energetic man and made a good mayor.”

Alexander Lancaster Harris witnessed so much in his time on earth. He took risks in his lifetime that few would take today, and in his time as mayor he established the modern public school system, signed the papers to bring the railroad across the river and tempered the remaining tensions post-war. He uprooted his family at least three times to make the best of the opportunities which did exist –whether that be a small town in Illinois, the bustling city of St. Louis, the soon-to-be metropolis of Kansas City or the mining towns of Colorado.