Time Capsules

Time Capsule: Facing Only Minor-Party Opposition, Mayor Koch Wages Vigorous Campaign in 1981

Time Capsule: Facing Only Minor-Party Opposition, Mayor Koch Wages Vigorous Campaign in 1981

Despite winning both major party nominations — the first New York City mayor to do so — Mayor Ed Koch announced that he would wage a full-scale campaign for re-election against minor-party opposition during this week in 1981. Koch, who swept past Brooklyn assemblyman Frank […]

by · September 24, 2017 · 0 comments ·
Time Capsule: Protest Votes Loomed Large in ‘92 Ohio Slugfest

Time Capsule: Protest Votes Loomed Large in ‘92 Ohio Slugfest

As Americans head to the polls later today, it’ll be interesting to see if a genuine dark-horse candidate — somebody running outside the duopoly, someone nobody expected nor even heard of, for that matter — could startle the pundits with an unexpectedly strong showing. Given […]

by · November 4, 2014 · 2 comments ·
Conservatives tried to create havoc for longtime Republican Sen. Charles Percy in 1984.

Time Capsule: Conservatives Reject Chuck Percy, Back Libertarian in ’84 Illinois Senate Race

Rejecting Republican Sen. Charles H. Percy of Illinois as a “partisan Democrat in Republican’s clothing,’“ a group of nationally-recognized conservative leaders endorsed the Libertarian candidate for the U.S. Senate on this weekend in 1984. Too often, they believed, Percy had voted with liberal Democrats. Percy […]

by · September 20, 2014 · 0 comments ·
Time Capsule: Benjamin Spock Stumps in Bennington in ’72

Time Capsule: Benjamin Spock Stumps in Bennington in ’72

Benjamin Spock, the nation’s most famous pediatrician and the People’s Party candidate for president, carried his antiwar message to students at Bennington College in Vermont during this week in 1972. The 69-year-old Spock, who had spoken on hundreds of college campuses in the late sixties […]

by · September 18, 2014 · 2 comments ·
Time Capsule: McGovern Alleges ‘Whitewash’ in Watergate Investigation

Time Capsule: McGovern Alleges ‘Whitewash’ in Watergate Investigation

Trailing by a staggering 34 points in the polls, Democratic presidential candidate George S. McGovern of South Dakota accused the Nixon White House of ordering a “whitewash” in a federal grand jury investigation of the Watergate break-in on this day in 1972. “From the first […]

by · September 16, 2014 · 0 comments ·
Time Capsule: An Aging Norman Thomas Places Socialist on New York City Ballot in 1963

Time Capsule: An Aging Norman Thomas Places Socialist on New York City Ballot in 1963

Still battling the two-headed Goliath, an aging Norman M. Thomas — a six-time candidate for the presidency on the Socialist Party ticket — filed nominating petitions to place the name of Richard F. Parrish, the Socialist Party’s candidate for councilman at-large in Manhattan, on the […]

by · September 15, 2014 · 0 comments ·
Time Capsule: Kucinich Predicts Longshot Candidacy Will Become ‘Surprise of the 2004 Election’

Time Capsule: Kucinich Predicts Longshot Candidacy Will Become ‘Surprise of the 2004 Election’

Though lingering near the bottom of the polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich predicted ten years ago today that his longshot bid for the White House would become “the surprise of the 2004 election.” “This race is about to change,” said a buoyant […]

by · November 11, 2013 · 0 comments ·
Time Capsule: ‘Pitchfork Pat’ Bolts GOP, Declares Reform Party Candidacy

Time Capsule: ‘Pitchfork Pat’ Bolts GOP, Declares Reform Party Candidacy

Patrick J. Buchanan, the pugnacious conservative commentator whose insurgent candidacies briefly threatened the GOP’s frontrunners in 1992 and 1996, dropped out of the race for the Republican presidential nomination and announced that he was seeking the Reform Party’s nomination on the last Monday of October […]

by · October 28, 2013 · 3 comments ·
Time Capsule: Trotskyist Fred Halstead, Candidate for President in ’68

Time Capsule: Trotskyist Fred Halstead, Candidate for President in ’68

Fred W. Halstead, the Socialist Workers Party candidate for president in 1968, died of liver cancer at his home in Los Angeles on this day in 1988.  A longtime civil rights activist and prominent leader in the antiwar movement during the war in Vietnam, Halstead […]

by · June 2, 2013 · 1 comment ·
Time Capsule: Pair of Primary Wins Propel Humphrey into Serious Contention in ‘72

Time Capsule: Pair of Primary Wins Propel Humphrey into Serious Contention in ‘72

Following closely on the heels of a decisive win in Pennsylvania a week earlier, Sen. Hubert H. Humphrey of Minnesota was catapulted into serious contention for the Democratic presidential nomination by scoring a pair of victories in Indiana and Ohio on this day in 1972. […]

by · May 2, 2013 · 2 comments ·