Representative Myron Hawley McCord

Myron Hawley McCord (November 26, 1840 – April 27, 1908) was an American politician, businessman, and military officer who served in local and state offices in Wisconsin, represented Wisconsin’s 9th congressional district in the United States House of Representatives for one term, and later became governor of Arizona Territory and a United States marshal. He was born in Ceres Township, McKean County, Pennsylvania, on November 26, 1840, to Myron H. McCord and Anna Elizabeth (Ackerman) McCord. In the mid‑1840s his family moved to near Bolivar, New York, where he attended local schools and the nearby Richburg Academy. In 1854, he moved with his father to Shawano, Wisconsin, then a developing frontier community. There he worked for a company that operated a farm and sawmill, laboring during the summers and attending school in the winter months over the next five years, gaining both practical and formal education.

At the age of 20, McCord entered business on his own, engaging in road and bridge construction and logging, activities that tied him closely to the economic development of northern Wisconsin. During the early part of the American Civil War he helped train volunteers but did not see combat. McCord married Anna Mariah Murray in December 1861. She was the daughter of Julius Murray and granddaughter of Elias Murray, who had been assigned to Wisconsin as the Northern Superintendent of Indian Affairs and oversaw, among other duties, the relocation of the Menominee Indians from their home on Lake Poygan to their present reservation near Shawano. The Murray family settled in Shawano and became prominent in early county government. Myron and Anna McCord had four children: Charles J., Florence, Mary, and Prudence. In 1876, while traveling on business, McCord obtained a divorce in Utah Territory and informed his wife upon his return to Wisconsin. On August 27, 1877, he married Sarah Etta Space; following this second marriage he moved to Merrill, Wisconsin. This union produced no children. After Sarah’s death on June 27, 1903, McCord married a third time, wedding Mary Emma Winslow, a second cousin of Sarah, in St. Louis on August 10, 1904.

McCord’s public career in Wisconsin developed alongside his expanding business interests. In 1864 he was elected Superintendent of Schools for Shawano County, Wisconsin, serving one term and declining to seek reelection. From 1868 to 1874 he was co‑publisher of the Shawano County Journal, reflecting an early and lasting involvement in the newspaper business. He was elected treasurer of Shawano County in 1869 and again in 1871. In 1872 he won election to the Wisconsin State Senate, serving the first of two terms and participating in state legislative affairs during a period of rapid growth in Wisconsin. After his move to Merrill following his second marriage, McCord became publisher of the Lincoln County Advocate. He also acquired partial ownership of a bank and invested in a firm that manufactured wood products, including doors, blinds, and window sashes, supported by lumber camps he owned in the Somo River pine region. The unincorporated town of McCord, Wisconsin, was named by the Soo Line Railroad for him when it established a whistle stop to serve his camps.

McCord continued to rise in Republican politics in the 1880s. He was elected to the Wisconsin State Assembly in 1880 and was a candidate for Speaker, though he withdrew his name to preserve party unity. His growing prominence led to his selection as a delegate to the 1884 Republican National Convention, where he supported James G. Blaine for the presidency. He was later appointed Register of the United States Land Office in Wausau, Wisconsin, a federal patronage position that further broadened his political connections. In 1888 he was elected as a Republican to the Fiftieth Congress, representing Wisconsin’s 9th congressional district. His single term in the United States House of Representatives, from March 4, 1889, to March 3, 1891, was not marked by major legislative achievements, but it placed him in the national arena during a significant period in American history and allowed him to participate in the democratic process on behalf of his constituents. While his congressional service was described as largely undistinguished, the friendships he formed there, particularly with fellow Republican William McKinley, then a rising figure in the House, proved influential in his later career. McCord’s attempts to win reelection in 1890 and 1892 were unsuccessful, and during this period he suffered a serious financial setback that led him to declare bankruptcy.

Following his bankruptcy, McCord moved in 1893 to Phoenix in Arizona Territory, where he rebuilt his finances and reestablished himself as a businessman and civic figure. In Arizona he invested in fruit orchards, farming, and cattle ranching, and acquired a half interest in the Arizona Gazette. He became an advocate for improving the territory’s livestock industry by importing higher‑quality cattle breeds to increase profitability. His growing prominence led Governor Louis C. Hughes to appoint him to the Territorial Board of Control in 1895. The board oversaw the territorial insane asylum, reform school, and prison, and McCord served both as a citizen board member and purchasing agent. During his tenure the board approved a controversial contract with Eugene S. Ives’s State of Arizona Improvement Company to construct a 13‑mile irrigation canal near Yuma using convict labor from the Yuma Territorial Prison at a rate of US$0.70 per man per day, with the territory bearing transportation, guard, and maintenance costs and receiving payment in the form of water from the canal. The terms provoked widespread public anger, and when Governor Benjamin Joseph Franklin took office he refused to honor the contract. McCord also approved the purchase of a 10‑acre tract of land for the insane asylum for $630, despite its appraised value of only $380, further fueling criticism. His service on the Board of Control ended on June 3, 1896, when Governor Franklin replaced him.

McCord remained active in Republican politics in Arizona. In 1896 he served as Maricopa County Republican chairman and was chosen as a delegate to the 1896 Republican National Convention, where he supported his old congressional colleague William McKinley. On the day of McKinley’s inauguration as President of the United States in March 1897, McCord wrote to him requesting appointment as governor of Arizona Territory. President McKinley submitted his nomination to the United States Senate on May 19, 1897. McCord’s appointment was supported by prominent territorial figures, including Albert C. Baker, Lewis Wolfley, Webster Street, and Joseph Kibbey, as well as by the Livestock Board of Arizona and the Arizona Agricultural Association. Opposition was vigorous: William “Buckey” O’Neill accused McCord of personally profiting from his actions on the Board of Control, and John Frank Wilson traveled to Washington, D.C., to lobby against the nomination. The attacks became so intense that McCord filed a libel suit against a New York City newspaper. Despite the controversy, the Senate confirmed him by a vote of 29 to 18.

On July 21, 1897, in Washington, D.C., Associate Justice John Marshall Harlan of the United States Supreme Court administered the oath of office to McCord as governor of Arizona Territory. The next day Governor Franklin received a telegram informing him that McCord had qualified and directing him to turn over all records to Territorial Secretary Charles H. Akers, prompting a brief dispute over whether a governor could be properly sworn in outside the territory. The issue was resolved on July 29, 1897, when Arizona Territorial Supreme Court Chief Justice Hiram Truesdale administered the oath again in Phoenix. During his year in office, McCord concentrated on making appointments to territorial offices, touring public institutions, and attending meetings of territorial boards. He chose to honor, with modifications, the earlier Yuma canal contract with the State of Arizona Improvement Company after the firm agreed to demonstrate good faith by providing several thousand dollars’ worth of equipment. Prisoners, who were credited with four days off their sentences for every three days worked, generally welcomed the opportunity. The project ultimately failed when the company could not raise sufficient funds, leaving the territory with $7,500 in uncollectable “water rights” against $13,741 in expenses and with only 7 of 11 escaped prisoners recaptured.

No session of the territorial legislature convened during McCord’s governorship, but he submitted an annual report on September 30, 1897. In it he emphasized Arizona’s pressing need for irrigation, listed potential dam sites, and urged federal assistance for water infrastructure. The report cataloged the territory’s mines and provided information on agricultural and cattle‑ranching activities. McCord noted the success of sugar beets near Yuma and suggested tobacco and peanuts as promising new crops. Addressing the question of statehood, he wrote that although Arizona’s population was not as large as some might deem necessary for self‑government, “we claim and insist that what we make up in quality what we lack in quantity.” He also recommended construction of a permanent territorial capitol building to safeguard public records. In early 1898, as public and political sentiment in the United States turned toward intervention in Cuba, McCord remained publicly silent, prompting the Arizona Gazette to remark that “Governor McCord in about the only executive that hasn’t declared war. Hadn’t you better move on the enemy, governor?” Privately, however, he sought authority to raise volunteers, and on April 3, 1898, he received a telegram authorizing two companies of volunteer cavalry from Arizona Territory. McCord recommended James H. McClintock and Buckey O’Neill as company commanders and Alexander O. Brodie as battalion commander. O’Neill recruited in northern Arizona and McClintock in the south; with 210 positions available, approximately 1,000 men volunteered. The Arizona companies became part of the First United States Volunteer Cavalry, the “Rough Riders,” and after arrival in San Antonio were reorganized into three companies, with Joseph L. B. Alexander appointed captain of the third.

Desiring to participate personally in the Spanish–American War, McCord used his influence with President McKinley to secure appointment as colonel of the First Territorial Infantry. On July 1, 1898, he requested a leave of absence from his gubernatorial duties to serve in the army. Secretary of the Interior Cornelius N. Bliss replied that, having voluntarily sought and accepted the colonelcy, McCord should promptly forward his resignation as governor. McCord submitted his resignation on July 9, 1898, effective August 1. The First Territorial Infantry reached Chickamauga Park but the war ended before it saw combat. McCord later stated that he had no regrets about leaving the governorship for military service. He was mustered out on February 15, 1899, and returned to Phoenix, resuming civilian life in the territory.

Shortly before President McKinley’s assassination in 1901, McCord’s old friend appointed him United States Marshal for Arizona, a post he held for four years. In this capacity he enforced federal law across the territory, including the escort of Chinese aliens to San Francisco for deportation under the Chinese exclusion laws. At the conclusion of his four‑year term he was not reappointed. As Arizona moved closer to statehood, McCord supported a joint statehood plan under which Arizona would be combined with New Mexico, a proposal that was ultimately rejected by many territorial residents and in Congress. In February 1906 he was appointed Collector of Customs at Nogales, Arizona, overseeing federal customs operations at the important border crossing with Mexico. McCord died from Bright’s disease on April 27, 1908, in Arizona and was buried in Merrill, Wisconsin, where he had spent many of his earlier business and political years.

Following his death, a legal dispute arose over his estate between his first wife, Anna McCord, and his third wife, Mary Emma McCord. Anna contended that her 1876 divorce was invalid because she had not waived her community‑property rights and had not been properly served with papers before the divorce was finalized. In McCord v. McCord (1911), 13 Arizona 277, the Arizona Territorial Supreme Court ruled that Mary McCord was the lawful heir and held that if Anna believed her divorce to be invalid, she should have challenged it during the three decades before her former husband’s death.