W. Haydon Burns
Encyclopedia
William Haydon Burns was the 35th Governor of Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...

 from 1965 to 1967. He was also Mayor of the city of Jacksonville, Florida
Jacksonville, Florida
Jacksonville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Florida in terms of both population and land area, and the largest city by area in the contiguous United States. It is the county seat of Duval County, with which the city government consolidated in 1968...

 from 1949 to 1965.

Early life

Born in Chicago, Illinois, Haydon Burns' family moved to Jacksonville in 1922, where he attended Andrew Jackson High School
Andrew Jackson High School (Jacksonville, Florida)
Andrew Jackson High School is the oldest fully accredited high school in Duval County, Florida. It is located just north of downtown Jacksonville on Main Street . It opened in 1927, followed by Robert E. Lee High School, which opened in 1928. It was originally an all-white school, but the school...

 before going on to attend Babson College
Babson College
Babson College is a private business school located in Wellesley, Massachusetts near Boston.- History :Babson College was founded by Roger Babson on September 3, 1919, as the Babson Institute. It was renamed "Babson College" in 1969...

 in Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

. Before the outbreak of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 he was an appliance salesman and a flight school operator. During the war, he joined the U.S. Navy and was posted as a technical officer in the office of the Secretary of the Navy. Following the war, he returned to Jacksonville and began a public relations and business consulting firm and worked selling appliance
Appliance
Appliance may refer to:* Home appliance, household machines, using electricity or some other energy input** Small appliances** Major appliances...

s.

Mayor of Jacksonville

In 1949 Burns announced his intention to run for Mayor of Jacksonville against incumbent C. Frank Whitehead. He defeated Whitehead in the Democratic Party
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

 primary, and then faced Jacksonville businessman William Ashley, a Democrat running as a political independent
Independent (politician)
In politics, an independent or non-party politician is an individual not affiliated to any political party. Independents may hold a centrist viewpoint between those of major political parties, a viewpoint more extreme than any major party, or they may have a viewpoint based on issues that they do...

, in a general election – an unusual occurrence, as Democrats had been dominant in city politics for decades. On June 21, 1949, Burns defeated Ashley to become the next mayor of Jacksonville.

Burns's first term as Mayor of Jacksonville was an abbreviated two-year stint; he was thereafter re-elected four more times, the longest consecutive stint of any mayor in the city's history. During his time in the mayor's office, he oversaw massive growth in Jacksonville. He promoted the city around the world in an attempt to lure international investments and to get corporations to relocate offices to the city. He commissioned the production of a slide show called "The Jacksonville Story", hundreds of audiences saw it around the world. The American National Exhibit showed a film version in the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

. Burns personally made presentations at The Hague
The Hague
The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...

 and in Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

. He made "The Jacksonville Story" known from coast to coast, and so was Jacksonville's mayor.

He was elected president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, president of the Florida League of Municipalities, and delegate to the International Congress of Municipalities. While mayor, he won tax breaks for insurance companies and Prudential Insurance relocated from New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

 to a skyscraper
Skyscraper
A skyscraper is a tall, continuously habitable building of many stories, often designed for office and commercial use. There is no official definition or height above which a building may be classified as a skyscraper...

 in Jacksonville. Other insurance companies followed, and Jacksonville became known as the insurance capital of the South.

A new courthouse and City Hall were built on the site of rotten wharves, and a long-promised Civic Auditorium was built on the river. Jacksonville Memorial Coliseum
Jacksonville Memorial Coliseum
Jacksonville Veterans Memorial Coliseum was an 11,000-seat multi-purpose arena, in Jacksonville, Florida, U.S. Built in 1960 and known as "northern Florida's most historic concert venues", it was home to most of the city's indoor professional sports teams and hosted various concerts, circuses and...

 and Sam W. Wolfson Baseball Park
Sam W. Wolfson Baseball Park
Samuel W. Wolfson Baseball Park, better known as Wolfson Park, was a baseball park in Jacksonville, Florida. It stood from 1954 until 2002, when it was demolished and replaced by the new Baseball Grounds of Jacksonville...

 made the city thoroughly modern. The Atlantic Coast Line Railroad
Atlantic Coast Line Railroad
The Atlantic Coast Line Railroad was an American railroad that existed between 1900 and 1967, when it merged with the Seaboard Air Line Railroad, its long-time rival, to form the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad...

, today CSX, moved from Wilmington, North Carolina
Wilmington, North Carolina
Wilmington is a port city in and is the county seat of New Hanover County, North Carolina, United States. The population is 106,476 according to the 2010 Census, making it the eighth most populous city in the state of North Carolina...

 to the Jacksonville riverfront. The world's largest Sears Roebuck store opened on what once was skid row. A modern expressway system took shape and the city got the Jacksonville Suns
Jacksonville Suns
The Jacksonville Suns are a minor league baseball team based in Jacksonville, Florida. The team is currently a member of the Southern League and is the class Double-A affiliate of the Miami Marlins Major League Baseball team...

 baseball franchise and a hockey team.

The city faced many problems during Burns' term. Racial violence ignited on August 27, 1960 during a protest to integrate downtown lunch counters in the Hemming Park
Hemming Plaza
Hemming Plaza is a public park, located in the heart of the government center in downtown Jacksonville, Florida. It originally served as a village green, was the first and is the oldest park in the city.-Beginnings:...

 shopping area. Segregationists responded by attacking the protesters with baseball bats and ax handles; the day is remembered as Ax Handle Saturday. Burns tried to blame the shameful incident on visitors but the police chief attributed the attacks to locals. The city's police department was ridden with scandal and multiple grand jury indictments were handed down on public officials all around him.

One of his final acts as mayor was his handling of the Hotel Roosevelt fire
Hotel Roosevelt fire
The Hotel Roosevelt fire, on December 29, 1963, was the worst fire that Jacksonville, Florida, had seen since the Great Fire of 1901, and it contributed to the worst one-day death toll in the city's history: twenty-two persons died, mostly from carbon-monoxide poisoning.At the time, the Hotel...

 in downtown. Although 23 people died, many other hotel guests survived. In 1964 he announced he would be stepping down as mayor to run for Governor of Florida. City Commissioner Lou Ritter
Lou Ritter
Louis Hampton "Lou" Ritter was an American politician and lobbyist. He served as mayor of Jacksonville, Florida from 1965 until 1967. A Democrat, he assumed office when W. Haydon Burns, mayor since 1949, resigned to become Governor of Florida...

 was appointed to take his place.

Governorship

Burns defeated Republican Charles Holley in the November 3 general election to become Governor of Florida. He was sworn in on January 5, 1965, to serve an abbreviated two year term. This short term came about because the cycle of gubernatorial elections was changed so as not to coincide with presidential election years. While in office, he oversaw progress in the development of a new state constitution, as well as new areas of outdoor recreation and industry. Also, Governor Burns opposed the death penalty
Capital punishment in Florida
Capital punishment is legal in the U.S. state of Florida. Florida was the first state to reintroduce the death penalty after the Supreme Court of the United States struck down all statutes in the country in the 1972 Furman v. Georgia decision, and the first to perform a post-Furman involuntary...

 and allowed no executions (the last pre-Furman
Furman v. Georgia
Furman v. Georgia, was a United States Supreme Court decision that ruled on the requirement for a degree of consistency in the application of the death penalty. The case led to a de facto moratorium on capital punishment throughout the United States, which came to an end when Gregg v. Georgia was...

 execution in Florida took place in 1964).

Governor Burns is also remembered for participating in a news conference at the Cherry Plaza Hotel in Orlando on November 15, 1965 introducing Walt and Roy Disney to Florida as they announced that the state would be the location of their "East Coast Disneyland."

The 1966 gubernatorial elections pitted the sitting governor against Robert King High
Robert King High
Robert King High was a reform Mayor of Miami, Florida from 1957 until his death, and the Democratic Party nominee for governor of Florida in 1966.-Early years:...

, a popular Miami politician. This primary was significant because Burns represented the conservative wing of the Democratic Party and High was the choice of the liberals from South Florida. Governor Burns lost the 1966 Democratic primary and then did not support High in the general election. Political observers in Florida point to High's supposed failure to seek such endorsement from Burns. This left the party divided in the face of united Republican support for Claude Kirk. He left office on January 3, 1967 as the first Democratic Governor of Florida in history to be succeeded by a Republican since Reconstruction.

Post-governorship

After his term ended, the governor returned to private business consulting in Jacksonville. In 1971, he made an unsuccessful attempt to be reelected mayor, but was defeated by incumbent Hans Tanzler
Hans Tanzler
Hans Gearhart Tanzler, Jr. is a former American politician and judge. He served as Mayor of Jacksonville, Florida from 1967 to 1979. During his administration, the City of Jacksonville consolidated with Duval County, making him the last mayor of the old city government and the first mayor of a...

 in the Democratic primary. Many of the projects that he help to create, such as the city's civic auditorium, rebuilt in 1996 and renamed the Times-Union Center for the Performing Arts
Times-Union Center for the Performing Arts
The Times-Union Center for the Performing Arts is a performance center and auditorium in Jacksonville, Florida, U.S. It opened in 1997, and was built on the former location of the Civic Auditorium. The Jim and Jan Moran Theater opened on February 8, 1997, and the The Robert E. Jacoby Symphony Hall...

, Wolfson Park, City Hall and the Jacksonville Coliseum have all been replaced with newer structures. However, his work for the city's growth remains evident today. Haydon Burns remained in Jacksonville until his death in 1987.

Jacksonville's main public library, built in 1965, was named the Haydon Burns Library
Haydon Burns Library
The Haydon Burns Library is a former library in downtown Jacksonville, Florida. It served as the main library in the Jacksonville Public Library system from 1965 until 2005, when it was replaced by the current facility. It is named for W. Haydon Burns, who served as Mayor of Jacksonville for...

 in honor of the former mayor. It was designed by Taylor Hardwick, a local architect who designed many local structures built in Jacksonville. In 2005 it was replaced by a new Main Library.

In 1966, the building located at 605 Suwannee Street in Tallahassee, Florida opened and was named the W. Haydon Burns Building. It became home to the State Road Department, now the Florida Department of Transportation
Florida Department of Transportation
The Florida Department of Transportation is a decentralized agency charged with the establishment, maintenance, and regulation of public transportation in the state of Florida. The department was formed in 1969. It absorbed the powers of the Florida State Road Department...

.

In 2004, the city of Jacksonville renamed the old City Hall, built by Burns, the Haydon Burns City Hall Annexe.

External links

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