The Ghosts of Lake County
My understanding of the Gary Mayoral Election of 1967
Stay Little and Be White
Arthur Martin Katz, former Gary city judge, deputy Lake County prosecutor, and mayor of Gary before Richard Gordon Hatcher, was the Democratic establishment’s pick. However, when local businessman Bernard Wendell Konrady entered the race, he knew his chances of winning another term were slim. With Hatcher’s entry, no one seriously believed he had a shot in hell. However, Katz and Konrady lost the mayoral primary to Hatcher, which cleared the way for his historic matchup with Joseph Bernard Radigan, local furniture czar, and the Republican nominee.
Suddenly the Republican party, which had no power worth speaking of in Gary since before World War II, became significant in the aspect of prejudice and race. Radigan’s Republican opponent was a black guy, Charles “Charlie” Mason. Radigan received 4,000 votes to Mason’s 170. Radigan won the Republican primary easily and became “the great white hope” in Gary, regardless if he wanted to be or not.
Lake County Democratic Party Chairman John George Krupa called the Democratic black nominee’s win “a disaster,” adding that maybe things would be okay if Hatcher “humbled himself” to the white establishment. However, of course, we all know Hatcher would do no such thing. As a result, Krupa’s main objective was to ensure that Hatcher lost the general election at almost all costs. For real, he said he would “sacrifice the election to the Republicans because loyalty to country comes before loyalty to party.”
Krupa and Hatcher battled toughly between the primary and the general elections. One would think Hatcher was running against Krupa instead of Radigan. Radigan, meanwhile, kept a pretty low profile. He held his events primarily out of the public eye, hosting fundraisers in Miller and the outskirts of Glen Park. The media said Radigan’s strategy was simple: “stay little and be white.” So the Republicans in Lake County held onto their collective popcorn boxes, watching the Democrats eat each other alive. Indeed, nothing like this ever occurred before.
Rather Be Dead Than Red
Krupa called Hatcher out, demanding he publicly denounces Stokely Carmichael and H. Rap Brown. Carmichael was a socialist civil rights organizer who became a key founder of the Black Panthers and was a target of J. Edgar Hoover. Hatcher refused the demand. As a result, Krupa refused to allow Hatcher to appoint poll registrars. Hatcher filed a lawsuit against the Lake County Democrats in return.
By August, the Hatcher campaign was running low on funds — $14 low. So, with the help of some Chicago advertizers, they put out a full-page ad in the New York Times begging for outside funding to continue campaigning to election day. Krupa refused to fundraise for Hatcher’s campaign. Gary’s criminal underworld offered to finance the campaign, but he turned down their offer of $70,000. After that, the outside funds came pouring in. Not only did the funding come, but endorsements by black and white celebrities came as well, including Marlon Brando.
Krupa ripped Hatcher and state Democratic Chairman Gordon St. Angelo with his “Politically, I would rather be dead than Red” speech. It is a backward saying of “rather be Red than dead,” a communist slogan used during the Cold War. St. Angelo tried to straddle the fence between Hatcher and Krupa but ended up being seen as weak after he would not question Hatcher’s patriotism. St. Angelo charged that Krupa was using “McCarthyism” style tactics.
Krupa was also angry about VP Hubert Humphry’s arm-around-the-shoulder photo with Hatcher in Washington D.C., which happened the day after his backward communist slogan speech. Hatcher enjoyed the pleasure of being endorsed by RFK, Birch Bayh, and Vance Hartke.
While Krupa ranted, steamed, and postured, Hatcher seemed to become bulletproof. He was so relaxed that he began to stop speaking so much about Krupa. When someone asked him why wasn’t he talking about Krupa, he responded:
“I expect Mr. Krupa will be most famous county chairman in the country when it’s over… but what happens to Gary?” — Richard Hatcher
Though these political shenanigans were of the most negative nature, the most diabolical moves have yet come to light.
Ghosts in the Machine
Whispers were floating around the white lexicon of Gary. Whispers of “ghosts” in the mist so powerful that they would be sure to help Hatcher lose. The “ghosts” would rise to claim their place — but not in the way people thought.
Republican Jerome Reppa, Lake County Election Board Member from Gary, pulled a Rudy Giuliani and let the “ghosts” out the crypt too early. He stated that he expected considerable fraud in the filing of absentee ballots. No doubt he had some sort of insider information, but to what extent was unknown. Krupa, fully confident in his ability to control the machine, introduced his theory — claiming that massive voter fraud would help Hatcher get elected. He claimed blacks would gang up in front of polling places and scare white voters away.
In a move that was undoubtedly a way to cover his ass, Krupa himself called for U.S. Justice Department oversight of election day activities. Meanwhile, the whispers grew louder. They spoke of black voter rolls, which got illegally purged. Finally, the whispers grew loud enough to be heard by the FBI. They paid a visit to the Lake County Election Board’s office. Krupa, arrogant in his power, denied there was a purge happening. In reality, he wanted his “ghosts” to stay buried under the guise of credibility.
Ever the slickster, Krupa announced that the validity of 5,000 black voter registrations in Gary was currently vigorously investigated. He blamed the Republicans, whom, he claimed, had searched the black voter rolls and found illegally registered people. The “ghosts” were on the attack. As a result of this “illegal” activity, 5,286 names disappeared from polling lists. Letters got sent to each name. 1,000 were returned-to-sender. Hatcher did not believe in ghosts. Suspicious, he immediately smelled a conspiracy to cheat him out of the election and quickly got in touch with Attorney General Ramsey Clark and President LBJ.
However, Krupa’s “ghosts” were not loyal. They jumped Krupa’s ship and into Hatcher’s, bringing evidence of Krupa’s massive voter fraud with them. Hatcher immediately took to the press and the government, touting evidence that Krupa was engaged in “fraudulent registration in white areas.” Two hundred fifty fraudulent white names were recycled repeatedly and placed on ballots cast to the tune of 5,000. Some reports had a total of up to 10,000. However, the numbers do not matter. Krupa was caught red-handed. Indeed caught red, but he was not dead.
Suddenly, Joe Radigan made his appearance. He chastised Hatcher for allegedly spreading a “deliberate lie,” His posturing was the “cries of a looser.” The fact was that blacks were 55% of Gary’s population, but whites had 48,000 voter registrations in the May primary. Right before the general, the number of white registrations increased to over 100,000. Nevertheless, Krupa still felt the need to pad-the-bra and register 5,000 to 10,000 fake voters. Even with evidence of fraud in plain sight, Krupa still refused to allow Hatcher to play.
Shakedown
On Halloween, Hatcher formally filed a discrimination lawsuit with the U.S. Justice Department. This lawsuit shook the region and country. By chance, the U.S. Justice Department had its lawsuit, and the two suits were combined by court decree — contested unsuccessfully by the defense lawyers of all parties sued. This combination of lawsuits was historic.
Krupa — who was also the Lake County Democratic Chairman — was a crucial figure in the lawsuit. It did not help him that he had a past track record of denouncing Hatcher every chance he got. Krupa was a man with much power. Not only was he the county clerk and the Democratic chairman, but he also controlled the Lake County Board secretary and the electoral canvassing board. He said the allegations against him were “a damned lie,” and the suites were purely an attempt by Washington D.C. to undermine his authority.
Other names in the lawsuit were election board chairman Walter Zubriggen, Lake County Election Board member Jerome J. Reppa (who would later become a partner in crime with Chet Dobis), and Board of Voter Registration members Anthony Dobis (uncle of Chet) and Robert H. Rooda. All got accused of violating the 14th and 15th Amendments, the Voting Rights Acts of 64–65, and the Civil Rights Acts.
Once more, Joe Radigan crawled out of his safe zone, criticizing Hatcher’s lawsuit as being “reckless and irresponsible.” However, he declined to participate in the events in general, not wanting to tango with the federal government. Thus far, outside of being Hatcher’s opponent, his name was clean.
Facing calls for his resignation from Democratic officials in Indiana and D.C., Krupa rescinded the purge of black voter rolls and restored all names removed in “special binders.” He called himself preempting a court order that would force them to restore the names. The following week, Northwest Indiana became the first area in the country to face racial voter fraud and discrimination charges by the Justice Department, upheld by a jury. Hatcher was relieved with vindication.
Seeing the potential for trouble during election day, Governor Branigin mobilized the Indiana National Guard specifically for Gary. Krupa praised the move, the current Gary mayor, M. Katz, questioned the move, while Hatcher called the move “provocative.” Southern Indiana politicians almost derailed the sending of the guard. They saw the use of the guard in this manner as “capricious.” They questioned why ISP or LCPD could not live up to the task and called all politicians involved “asinine.” Regardless, the guard was going to be there. Katz and the GPD preemptively sent policemen out to the black neighborhoods, attempting to establish a “positive rapport” and display the strength of the force before a single vote got cast. Even contingency plans were drawn up with the police forces in other cities around Gary to supply extra muscle if needed — but Katz hoped like hell that it would not be.
Election Day
On November 6, 1967, dead in the heat of the mayoral election, the FBI handed over evidence of voter fraud in white areas of Gary in federal court. One Mrs. Marion ‘Mary’ Tokarski, 123rd (or 121st) precinct committeewoman, testified that she had been “pressured” by the Lake County Democratic Party to register 51 voters in her precinct fraudulently. At the same time, black voter registrations got illegally purged from the rolls.
Tokarski’s role in these events was that she was given 48 fake names in the office of Anthony Dobis; she donated three names. Reports of the time called Tokarski’s fraudulent registrations “ghosts” — figments of her imagination. Nevertheless, Tokarski became a prime witness for the Justice Department — to the chagrin of her lawyers. She asked a compatriot, Tom Rakow, to cast the fake ballots.
“Iron workers would vote for ghost men and prostitutes would vote for ghost women.” — Mary Tokarski.
As the Indiana National Guard’s 113th Engineer Battalion entered the Lake County fairgrounds to prepare for election day, Hatcher hit the media, touting the allegations with an heir of inevitability. On election day, the Guard played cards, slept and read magazines at Gilroy Stadium, while Gary’s 77,000 voting electorate cast their ballots without one single incident of note.
Tokarski was chased away from her desk at her polling place by other whites. They threw insults at her, calling her a traitor and a “nigger lover” because she snitched. Horrified, she fled in a panic, only to be surrounded by a small mob who continued to yell at her. Finally, Tokarski was harassed at her home by whites threatening her life over the telephone.
Tokarski’s home had to be protected, but she changed her story by saying that Dobis did not give her 48 names but “election supplies.” By now, everyone was threatened, from Krupa to Hatcher. Krupa had to take his kids out of school, and protesters visited his home in East Chicago’s Roxanna neighborhood. Radigan asked for the U.S. Marshalls to guard the polls, but it is unknown whether they came.
As history notes, Richard Gordon Hatcher won the general election.
Ghost Busters?
On the next cold, upper 30s morning, Mayor Katz called the election “the greatest, quietest election in the city’s history.” The police chief was not so sunny about it. He called it “mild.” Radigan, Hatcher’s opponent, only complained about the FBI investigation. Krupa remained indignant, refusing to acknowledge Hatcher’s victory — even gloating that there was nothing the national Democratic party could do to remove him.
Krupa’s reputation in lake county suffered tremendously with minorities. All and all, he was seen as a bigot, a racial propagandist, and a shyster. Even people in his city, East Chicago, distrusted him. However, the white machine continued to hail Krupa. A few weeks after the election, he received an award of merit from the Hobart Township Democratic Women’s Club for his “service to the party.”
Nevertheless, Krupa continued to push for purging voting rolls. He attempted two meetings with mayor-elect Hatcher, both of which Hatcher never tended. Instead, Hatcher pushed Krupa to resign as Lake County Democratic chairman, wanting a new chairperson even before pushing for a negro-supported chairperson. However, of course, Krupa refused.
Krupa managed to win two more terms as Lake County Democratic chair before resigning after Hatcher won the mayoral Democratic nomination for a second time. This was when Hatcher and Krupa shook hands for the first time, possibly since before 1967. After that, ‘Hollywood’ Pastrick ended up taking control of the Lake County Democratic Party. Krupa took a position in the Pastrick administration as head of the water department. Over time, Krupa’s star faded.
Hatcher’s wins destroyed the confidence of the white Democratic establishment in Lake County. As a result, Gary went through a political renaissance of historic proportions. Hatcher signaled a new age of reform, with a populace exuberant in the expectation of better days that were not to come.