Francis Grevemberg

Colonel Francis Carroll Grevemberg (born 1914) was the superintendent of the Louisiana state police from 1952-1955, who is best remembered for his fight against organized crime. Grevemberg, who was born in Lafayette was descended from one of the oldest and most prominent families in Louisiana. He twice sought the governorship, as a Democrat in the 1955 party primary and as the Republican nominee in the April 19, 1960, general election.

Grevemberg served in the U.S. Army in World War II. He was in Anzio, Italy, on D-Day. He received the French Croix de Guerre, the Italian Valor Cross, and the Soldiers Medal for Heroism.

Louisiana State Police superintendent

Grevemberg was appointed to head the state police by newly-elected Governor Robert F. Kennon. His book "My Wars: Nazis, Mobsters, Gambling and Corruption" tells about his experiences with the Mafia, which he said tried to kill him, bribe him, and kidnap his children. The mob sent him a Mafia black hand death threat letter. The mob began operating in Louisiana during the administration of popular Governor Huey Pierce Long, Jr. (1928-1932), when New York City mobster Frank Costello brought slot machines into the state. Grevemberg's book chronicles his fight against gambling and vice. Slot machines and casino devices, illegal in Louisiana at the time, were operated by the Mafia and other criminal elements.

Grevemberg said that he could not have carried on under constant threats from the mob without the inspiration of his wife, Dorothy Maguire Grevemberg (born September 1, 1917), whom he called "the love of my life." He was also aided by journalist W. Thomas Angers of Lafayette and Jim McLean of the Associated Press and pastors and citizens from the Louisiana Moral and Civic Foundation for the strength to persevere.

Democratic Senator Estes Kefauver of Tennessee, chairman of the U.S. Senate Special Committee to Investigate the Influence of Organized Crime in Interstate Commerce, credited Grevemberg with transforming Louisiana from being one of the most corrupt states to one of the cleanest during the 1950s. Gambling spots across South Louisiana were closed en masse, and the raids on illegal liquor sales even touched Kennon’s hometown of Minden, the seat of Webster Parish. On a Saturday in November 1954, the day of the traditional Louisiana State University v. University of Arkansas at Fayetteville football game in Shreveport, a state police raid in Minden resulted in the arrest of several local residents on charges of bootlegging, including the then Democratic mayor, John T. David.

Grevemberg's crusade was the subject of a 1958 film by Universal Studios entitled "Damn Citizen". Keith Andes (1920-2005) played the role of Grevemberg, and Margaret Hayes (1916-1977) played Dorothy. Famed character actor Gene Evans (1922-1998) also had a leading part.

The Democratic gubernatorial campaign, 1956

In 1955, Grevemberg left the state police position to seek the Democratic gubernatorial nomination to succeed Governor Kennon. He ran a poor fourth in the race, with 62,309 votes (7.6 percent). Mayor deLesseps Story Morrison, Sr., of New Orleans polled 191,576 (23.4 percent). The winner in the first round was Huey Long's younger brother, Earl Kemp Long, with 421,681 (51.4 percent). Two other contenders divided the remaining 18 percent of the vote. Earl Long was then unopposed in the general election held in the spring of 1956. Never did Huey or Earl Long face a Republican candidate for office.

Dodd considered Grevemberg a phony

William J. "Bill" Dodd, a veteran Louisiana officeholder and an observer of the state political scene, had no use for Grevemberg. In his "Peapatch Politics", Dodd, without using Grevemberg's name, charged that the former state police superintendent did not undertake his crusade against gambling until near the end of his term so that he could gain maximum political exposure as a reformer running for governor.

Dodd said: "do-gooders, crime commission buffs, and many Protestant preachers joined up with and supported this faker who was acting as a reformer. The biggest drunkard, whoremonger, gambler, and wife-beater can put on a uniform and begin cussing crime by day, while he slips around and commits it by night, and many gullible church people will carry his banner. So it was with that policeman-turned-politician. My own Protestant minister preached sermons bragging on him. He told me that he couldn't vote for several of my favorite candidates because they were Roman Catholics, but he was 100 percent for the policeman [Grevemberg] , who was a Catholic. He was for him, he said, because he was against crime."

The Republican gubernatorial campaign, 1960

In 1959-1960, Grevemberg rejected cries of "It can't be done" and switched parties to run for governor as a Republican. He challenged former Governor Jimmie Davis, winner of a hard-fought Democratic primary and runoff. Grevemberg called for abolition of useless positions in state government and industrial recruitment efforts. Among his supporters were Charles deGravelles and his wife, Virginia deGravelles, two future leaders in the fledgling Louisiana party.

His candidacy offered the state something that it had not seen before, a contested general election for governor. "Never before have the voters in this state been given such an opportunity for self-expression," opined the "Alexandria Daily Town Talk", "It is a rare opportunity for us to take part in an advanced course in government and politics." The "Town Talk"'s managing editor, Adras LaBorde, gave more attention to the Davis-Grevemberg than did most of the other Louisiana newspapers.

Democrats were sufficiently confident of overwhelming victories to restrict their general election activities to a few party harmony speeches. Davis had stopped campaigning after he defeated Mayor Morrison and did not return to active campaign status until a few weeks prior to the general election.

Grevemberg polled only 86,135 votes (17 percent). Davis received 407,907 (81.5 percent). Grevemberg scored his highest percent, 39.9 in Terrebonne Parish, and his second-best showing was the 27.2 percent in his native Lafayette Parish. In several parishes, including Kennon's Webster Parish, Grevemberg polled less than 2 percent of the ballots.

Grevemberg was outraged at newspaper editorials against him. "My main purpose for entering this race was toward a two-party system. . . I hope I have convinced a sizable number of people we do need two parties." Grevemberg was particularly hostile toward the "New Orleans Times-Picayune", which called him a "turncoat" after he left the Democratic Party, adding: "I risked my life and those of my family in attempts to rid this state of racketeers... These newspapers have lived up to the reputation given them by Huey Long that they were yellow journals."

The GOP was still four years away from offering voters a more competitive choice in a Louisiana gubernatorial election. At the close of the campaign, Grevemberg called upon President Dwight D. Eisenhower to investigate Mafia figure Carlos Marcello of Gretna, the seat of Jefferson Parish, in light of failed efforts to have Marcello deported. He said that he harbored no ill will toward Davis but was merely trying to plant the seeds of a two-party system in Louisiana.

How did Huey P. Long, Jr., really die?

"My Wars" also describes a ride into north Louisiana, in which eyewitness state troopers at the scene of the shooting of Huey Long in 1935 informed Grevemberg that Dr. Carl Weiss (1906-1935) was not armed and that Long was in fact shot to death by his own bodyguards. Grevemberg signed an affidavit to this effect with attorney and publisher Thomas Angers. Grevemberg related how the shooting of Long came up during a conversation among four troopers accompanying Grevemberg on a casino raid. Grevemberg said that the troopers told how Weiss' gun had been taken from his car after the shooting. "It appears. . . that all of the actions following the shooting were a conspiracy to cover up the accidental death of Senator Long and the killing of Dr. Weiss," said Grevemberg. The troopers told Grevemberg that what started out as a fist to Long's lip by Dr. Weiss triggered an accidental shooting that ended in a hail of gunfire. Weiss was a son-in-law of a south Louisiana district judge, Benjamin Pavy of Opelousas, the seat of St. Landry Parish, whom Long had gerrymandered out of his position. This claim was also revealed in a 1990s segment of the former NBC series "Unsolved Mysteries", hosted by Robert Stack (1919-2003).

In 2002, Grevemberg, affectionately termed "Grevy," was inducted into the Louisiana Political Museum and Hall of Fame in Winnfield. He and Dorothy reside in New Orleans.

References

* "Alexandria Daily Town Talk", April 14, 18, 20, 1960
* William J. "Bill" Dodd, "Peapatch Politics: The Earl Long Era in Louisiana Politics"
* http://www.cityofwinnfield.com/museum.html
* http://www.politicsla.com/press_releases/2005/january/012505_MY%20WARS.htm
* http://www.press-herald.com/echoes/2004/1008echoes.html
* http://www.louisiana101.com/ideashuey_story1.html