Frank Rizzo - Softcover

S. A. Paolantonio

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0940159279 ISBN 13: 9780940159273

Publisher: Camino Books, 1994

Synopsis

Here is the 10th anniversary edition of the first full-scale biography of Frank Rizzo, one of the most beloved and feared public figures in urban American history. Sweeping and finely detailed, this is a work of scholarship that reads like a novel, packed with colorful new details and revealing new stories about a man whose life demonstrated how the force of personality can affect history.

About this title

About the Author:

Formerly a reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer, S.A. PAOLANTONIO now works for ESPN. JOHN F. TIMONEY served as the police commissioner of Philadelphia.

From Publishers Weekly:

This well-researched, savvy biography limns the unlikely career of Frank Rizzo (1920-1991), who won mayoral nominations in Philadelphia from both major parties, maintaining power not through political philosophy or machine politics but by sheer personal magnetism, shows Paolantonio. A city cop, Rizzo switched his allegiance from the Republican to the Democratic party when offered the position of police commissioner by the Democratic mayor in 1966. In the summer of 1967, when riots broke out in Newark and Detroit, his law-and-order tactics kept the lid on in Philadelphia, gaining approval from whites and blacks alike. But much of Rizzo's political career was based on racial polarization, according to the author, from his first year as mayor in 1972 when he instructed his police commissioner "to fight federal lawsuits to open the police department to minorities and women" to his return bid in 1987 (this time as a Republican) when he disregarded the black community. If Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Paolantonio sometimes sacrifices style and the big picture for blow-by-blow accounts of aspects of Rizzo's career, this is nevertheless a worthy addition to books about urban politics. Photos not seen by PW .
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Camino Books
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0940159279
• ISBN 13: 9780940159273
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 420