User:Rcaliri/Silace F. ("Shag") Taylor

Silace "Shag" Taylor acted as Ward Boss in the South End of Boston, Massachusetts for the African American community that resided there during the first half of the twentieth century. In ward 9, "Shag" Taylor, traded votes for patronage and aligned himself with James Michael Curley in order to secure a position for the black community. Taylor was passionate about getting African Americans into politics, and the pinnacle of this effort is when he helped get Lincoln Pope, Boston’s first black Democratic office-holder, elected.

Overview
A handful of local political leaders traded power for patronage, much as the Irish ward bosses had done some fifty years earlier. “Shag” Taylor, a local pharmacist, became boss of Ward 9 with the help if his organization, called the Massachusetts Colored League. During the 1930s and 1940s Shag and his brother Balcom (“Bal”) worked with the Curley machine out of their Lincoln Drugstore on Tremont Street, exchanging votes in the black wards for jobs, housing, and occasionally a Thanksgiving turkey.

Early Life
Born in 1887 in Virginia, Shag moved to Boston in his mid-twenties and became a Pharmacist, residing in the South End neighborhood. The South End had more recently become the seat of the black community at the start of the Great Migration of southern blacks to the North. Many people found work in these years in shoe factories or shipyards, and with the South End located just minutes downtown, it was convenient for the growing working-class population. During the eighteenth century, what existed of Boston’s free black community was in the North End, during the nineteenth century it was in the West End, and by the twentieth century it was in the South End with Dr. Shag Taylor and his Lincoln Pharmacy on Tremont Street.

As a result of the Black population continuing to be merged into the South End, the residents could be more conveniently overlooked by politicians and their neighborhood-centered agendas. Boston was a city of ethic enclaves where citizens viewed the world through the lens of their own urban villages, and with the absence of African Americans in political spheres, the community was not attended to with equal consideration. The people needed a leader to act in the same manner as the “ward bosses” that led the other Boston districts in the years prior. The ward bosses gave voice to the districts demands, whispering in the ears of the politicians the benefits that the support provided could return to their career. Votes were traded for favors; social and political advancement depended on who you knew and what you could gain. For the black population of the South End, Shag Taylor stepped in to represent the under-heard black voice. To do this, he had to align himself with the most powerful person in Boston at the time, James Michael Curly.

Ward 9 Boss
Taylor acted as boss to Ward 9 during the first half of the twentieth century, and is the only recognized African American ward boss in Boston. He acknowledged that the only way his neighbors were going to be noticed, and his community heard, would be to ransom patronage for favors. The Lincoln Pharmacy became the base of old-fashioned ward politics for the Black community. Shag Taylor, with help from his younger brother Balcom, would set up meetings with Curley in the Black community, run ads in the paper for him, and use the favors that people owed them to pressure people in supporting white candidates in the Democratic party. The black vote was starting to be recognized as valuable as the voting tides were changing, giving the community some of the political clout other groups had enjoyed as being part of the establishment.

The pinnacle of Taylor’s success for the Black community was with the election of African America Lincoln Pope in 1958 to the state legislator. In his election to the State House of Representative, he Boston’s first black Democratic office-holder. But this did not prove enough power to keep Taylor’s machine alive with the aging Curley losing his political authority and a “New Boston” being shaped. Taylor was never able to create an independent base of political power to sustain past the Curley administration.

South End Culture
The South End in the early twentieth century had become a “thriving nexus of cultures, religions, and beliefs with residents creating an urban oasis from the hectic downtown. ” The district was well laid out and offered low rents for the relative closeness of city jobs for both male and female workers. This led to a neighborhood comprised of people from all walks of life working hard side by side to be recognized.

But as the years passed the area became predominantly more African American in the same turn that Bostonians became more vocal in their prejudice towards the black race. The flight to suburbia increased in the white populations, and the number of available home loans for the South End area decreased, leaving the black community belted into a lower-income area. By the 1950s, the South End was already labeled a “blighted area” and the majority of local banks refused to grant mortgages or provide home improvement loans. As a result of what came to be known as “redlining”, even if people wanted to stay in their communities despite the racial climates, “a great many young veterans and their families were forced to go outside the city and use their G.I. loans to purchase single-family homes in suburban areas ” where they found mortgage rates were lower and the banking policies more generous.

The South End at this time was also know for it's thriving nightlife scene. After finishing the uptown gigs, the likes of Count Basie, Sabby Lewis, Stan Getz, and other such popular jazz musicians could be seen playing at local late-night joints in the jazz mecca area. These hot spots included the Royal Palms, Eddie Levine's, the Pioneer Club, Handy's Grille, Tic-Toc, Connolly's, Estelle's, the Hi-Hat, The Savoy, The Cave, Basin Street, Louie's Lounge, and Wally's Paradise. Wally's is the only venue to have survived to the present day.

Community Reflections
South End resident Myra McAdoo remembers Taylor as effective and respected. "He knew everyone in the neighborhood and what they may need. People trusted him for help.”

“Shag Taylor could get your street cleaned, fix a pothole, get a vacant lot cleared, garbage collected, and abandoned car removed,” recalled Thomas Atkins, a young politician who became the first black Bostonian to win election to the city council. “If you needed someone released from jail, needed a job-whatever. Nobody had any questions he was the premier man, he was the person, he was the machine’s man, and his power came from the Curley machine” recalled first black City Councilor Tom Atkins.

“Taylor was no person, in my opinion, to be a leader of the colored people…they [blacks] knew him for what he was, and you didn’t have to give him too much…They would give him liquor; they’d give him anything. And he was the dispenser of goodies.”

Relationship With James Michael Curley
During the years Curley was in office, Taylor was able to wield a small amount of syphoned power, which he used to advance the black population’s position in the city.

End Of An Era
Turning from the downtown area to Boston’s surrounding neighborhoods, Hynes sought to build up his own strength among black voters in the South End by bypassing both the local party boss, Dr. Silas F. (“Shag”) Taylor, and the old-time Curley Democrats, and by bringing in his own people.