Sep 18, 2008 5:25 pm US/Central
Groundbreaking Former Alderman Anna Langford Dies
Ms. Langford Was City's First African-American Female Alderman
CHICAGO (CBS) ―
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Anna Langford, the city's first African-American woman alderman, has died at the age of 90.
CBS
Anna Langford, the first African-American woman to serve in the Chicago City Council, passed away on Wednesday night.
Ms. Langford died at the age of 90 at her home after a brief battle with lung cancer, according to her son, Chicago Fire Department Media Affairs Director Larry Langford.
She served four terms on the City Council, representing the 16th Ward until 1990. She was one of the first two women elected to the body in 1971, and during her service, she fought racism and sexism to pave the way for others at City Hall.
Born in Springfield, Ohio, Anna Langford moved to Chicago after the deaths of her parents.
It was her mother's death -- an act of racism -- that would propel her into the world of civil rights activism. Ms. Langford's mother, a white woman, went to an Ohio hospital suffering from appendicitis. But when her biracial children showed up, hospital staff ordered her transferred to a hospital serving African Americans. En route, her appendix burst, and she died.
In Chicago, Ms. Langford was raised by family friends and grew up poor but undaunted. She was a graduate of Hyde Park High School and Roosevelt University. She became a lawyer in 1956, after attending John Marshall Law School.
She then became a civil rights attorney, organizing voter drives in the South. She also allowed the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. to use her home to plan for a march on Cicero to promote integration.
In 1971, she won her first aldermanic election, putting her in charge of the 16th Ward that included parts of Englewood, Back-of-the-Yards and Gage Park.
She lost her 1975 re-election bid, lost again in an attempted comeback in 1979, then saw victory in two following elections in 1983 and 1987. And in the early 1980s, Ms. Langford challenged a onetime Illinois congressman named Harold Washington to either run for Chicago mayor -- or she would.
"She kind of goaded Washington into running for mayor. She even printed up some cards that said 'Langford For Mayor,'" Larry Langford said. "I've still got them."
She was there during the infamous council wars, when Mayor Harold Washington was in a constant battle with his political enemies. Former aldermen say a bowl of candy Langford kept on her council desk would sometimes bring the two sides together.
"It we got into a vitriolic discussion about something everyone would wander over to Anna's desk to get candy and she'd have them start talking to each other," said radio show host and former Alderman Cliff Kelley.
Washington was elected in 1983 and died of a heart attack in 1987 -- at the beginning of his second term, setting off a bitter battle between two African-American aldermen, Eugene Sawyer and Timothy Evans, that thrust Ms. Langford into the role of peacemaker.
''I beg all of you, don't destroy this city with hatred. The mayor was an independent Democrat. But he believed in independence," Ms. Langford told the Council.
During a heated power struggle that went nearly all night in City Council chambers a week after Washington died, Ms. Langford backed Sawyer, who ultimately won a City Council election for acting mayor.
"The mayor would want us to proceed to include all of the people of the City of Chicago – not just the blacks, not just the browns, not just the whites, but all of the people of the City of Chicago," Ms. Langford said at the time.
On Thursday, current and former aldermen remembered Ms. Langford as a fighter and peacemaker.
"Although she was really hard relative to her philosophical beliefs, she also could disagree without being disagreeable," Kelley said.
"I know that she had a much harder row to hoe than those of us who followed after her, so I appreciate her independence and her feistiness, and as I said, her being a pioneer," added Ald. Toni Preckwinkle (4th).
Mediator, friend, fighter -- while they all describe Langford, she is perhaps best loved for the role she played as alderman. Residents of the 16th Ward she once controlled talk of the jobs she provided for teens, or the food drives for the needy.
In 2003, Ms. Langford was named one of the DuSable Museum's African-American history makers, and in a CBS 2 story, she reflected on her groundbreaking career.
"I feel good about myself, what I've been able to do," Ms. Langford told CBS 2's Jim Williams, "for the little gal in the alley who would never be anything."
Even in illness, the woman who became known as an outspoken supporter of Mayor Harold Washington was able to take in both political parties' conventions -- by television -- in recent weeks.
Ms. Langford's son chuckles about the night Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin spoke at the Republican convention. He looked over at his mother and noticed she was pretending to play a violin.
"She couldn't talk much," Larry Langford said. "But mama was over there playing the violin -- she was working the violin like 'Who cares?' She was a Democrat to the end."
Larry Langford added in a statement Thursday: "Fellow council members knew her as impeccably honest. There was never a hint of scandal of any kind in her tenure."
Besides her only son, survivors include three grandchildren and a great-grandchild.
Neighbors, relatives and friends will have a chance to say good bye to Langford at a public memorial next Thursday. A private service will be held this weekend. The memorial service will take place at Hope Presbyterian Chuch in Englewood.
CBS 2's Dorothy Tucker and Joanie Lum, the Associated Press and the STNG Wire contributed to this report.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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