Eugene Sawyer

Eugene Sawyer ( born September 9, 1934 in Greensboro, Alabama; † 19 January 2008) was an American politician and 1987-1989 mayor of Chicago.

Sawyer was born in 1934 in Greensboro, Alabama, the eldest of six children of Bernice and Eugene Sawyer, Sr.. He studied at Alabama State University, where he received his Bachelor of Science in 1956. After a short time in Prentiss, Mississippi as a teacher taught mathematics and chemistry, he moved in 1957 to relatives in Chicago. Around 1959 Sawyer turned to the Democrats, in 1971 he was elected to the City Council of Chicago, where he represented the 6th municipality until 1988.

After the Chicago Mayor Harold Washington died in 1987 was surprising, Sawyer was appointed by the City Council as the new mayor. On December 2, he was sworn in and sparked David Duvall Orr, who had managed the office after the death of Washington briefly occupied interim basis until the appointment of a new mayor. After Sawyer in 1989 lost the election against Richard M. Daley, he withdrew from public life.

He was married and had three children. Sawyer died in January 2008 at the age of 73 after complications with several strokes after esophageal surgery.