Tom Pendergast

Thomas Joseph Pendergast ( born July 22, 1873 in St. Joseph, Missouri; † January 26, 1945 in Kansas City, Missouri) was an American businessman and politician.

Pendergast was since 1911 the economic and partly political leaders in Kansas City and Jackson County. " Boss Tom" Pendergast pursued a populist politics within the Democratic Party. In particular, during the Great Depression, he managed jobs, worked closely with the Mafia together and formed in the party cliques, by him had the faithful (for example, Harry S. Truman ) good opportunities for advancement. He controlled, although personally faithful churchgoers and non-drinkers, at the time of Prohibition nightlife in Kansas City and helped the latter to a unique resurgence, the emergence of the Kansas City Jazz conducive. Due to his gambling addiction and the excesses of his subordinates him increasingly slipped in 1930, the domination of Kansas City and Jackson County. In 1939 he was finally convicted of tax evasion and was serving a sentence of 15 months in federal prison Leavenworth. After his release he lived until his death retired at his home in Kansas City.