thumb|Whalen in 1929

Grover Aloysius Whalen (1886–1962) was a prominent politician, businessman, and public relations guru in New York City during the 1930s and 1940s.

Early years

Whalen was born on July 2, 1886, in New York City, the son of an Irish immigrant father and a French-Canadian mother. They named their son after President Grover Cleveland, who was married on the same day that their child was born. His father, Michael Whalen, was a successful trucking contractor and a Tammany Hall supporter.

Grover Whalen attended DeWitt Clinton High School and afterwards studied law. He then joined the staff of John Wanamaker's department store, with which he would long be associated. He married Anna Dolores Kelly in 1913.

In 1924, Whalen left the Hylan administration to assist Rodman Wanamaker in the operation of the Wanamaker department stores, serving as general manager. Wanamaker named him Vice President of Operations for the American Trans-Oceanic Company, a new airline flying Curtiss seaplanes between New York and Florida.

Police Commissioner

In 1928, he returned to civic life when he was appointed by Mayor Jimmy Walker to the position of New York City Police Commissioner.

The brutal scene was described by a reporter from the New York Times:

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Hundreds of policemen and detectives, swinging nightsticks, blackjacks, and bare fists, rushed into the crowd, hitting out at all with whom they came into contact, chasing many across the street and into adjacent thoroughfares and pushing hundreds off their feet. From all parts of the scene of battle came the screams of women and cries of men with bloody heads and faces.

Mr. New York

Whalen was known as the official greeter and organizer of many public events and celebrations taking place in New York during the first half of the 20th century. G.P. Putnam's Sons, the publisher of Whalen's autobiography, came up with Mr. New York as the title of his autobiography.

In the acknowledgements before beginning his autobiography, Whalen gives credit to the late Melville Minton, President of G.P. Putnam's Sons, for encouraging him to write a book about New York.

The bulk of his writing describes planning and execution of receptions, ceremonies, and civic projects under his direction. He provides vivid imagery and background information regarding specific events such as ticker-tape parades for American heroes like Lindbergh after the completion of his flight across the Atlantic Ocean from New York to Paris in 1927. Whalen also goes into great detail about the planning and intricacies behind the parades for returning World War II soldiers, most notably General Dwight D. Eisenhower in June 1945. (This needs clarification. Whi is "he" -- Costello or Luciano?)

In the beginning and ending chapters of the autobiography, Whalen provides valuable insight on the many things he values and loves about his city. In the first few chapters, Whalen writes with a nostalgic pen recollecting memories of the family culture of the close-knit neighborhood he grew up in on the Lower East Side. A character in Gregory Mcdonald's Flynn novels (published between 1976 and 1999) is Sgt. Richard Whalen, who is consistently addressed by the mischievous Flynn as "Grover". Whalen has no idea why Flynn does this, and finds it annoying.

Footnotes

  • "Grover Aloysius Whalen," at Find a Grave