Howard J. Samuels

Howard Joseph Samuels (December 3, 1919 – October 26, 1984) was a leading political figure in New York State in the 1960s and 1970s, and an important player on the national scene as well.

Early years

Samuels was born in Rochester, New York, on December 3 1919. After college at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he joined the U.S. Army and served as a lieutenant colonel in the Third Army under General George S. Patton. He was present during the liberation of the Nazi concentration camp in Buchenwald in 1945, an experience he never forgot.

After the war, he and his brother Richard founded the Kordite Company, a firm that manufactured plastic clotheslines, brooms, plastic bags and packaging, and other plastic products such as Baggies and Hefty garbage bags. The company did very well, and Samuels became a multi-millionaire. He married the former Barbara J. Christie, and the couple had eight children: William, Susan Carey, Catherine, Victoria, Howard Christie, Barbara, Janine, and Jacqueline.

Political life

In 1962, Samuels first became known to voters when he ran for the New York State Democratic Party nomination for governor, a race he did not win. In 1966, contrary to the wishes of state party leaders, the party rank and file revolted and nominated him over Orin D. Lehman to be their candidate for lieutenant governor. The ticket, headed by gubernatorial candidate Frank O'Connor, lost to the Republican nominees, Gov. Nelson Rockefeller and Lt. Gov. (later Governor) Malcolm Wilson.

Samuels later served as Under Secretary of Commerce in the administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson, and in 1968 was named the director of the Small Business Administration. In 1969, he irritated many in his own party when he supported a liberal Republican, John V. Lindsay, in his successful bid for re-election as mayor of New York City. In 1970 he ran again for the New York State Democratic Party nomination for governor, and barely lost to Arthur Goldberg. That year his political work was interrupted when his son, Howard C. Samuels, was arrested for marijuana possession in Greenwich Village. The young man was later arrested for possession of heroin and reported to have developed a heroin addiction. In 1971, Mayor Lindsay chose Samuels to be the first chairman of the city’s Off-Track Betting Corporation (OTB), a position which earned him the nickname “Howie the Horse.”

In May 1973, after several years of living apart, Samuels and his wife Barbara announced their legal separation. In December of that year, Samuels married Antoinette Chautemps, an economist and the daughter of Camille Chautemps, who served as Premier of France during the 1930s. The couple had two children, Camille and Dominique.

In 1974, Samuels ran again for governor of New York State. Despite having an early lead and the support of the Democratic State Committee, he lost again, this time to Congressman Hugh L. Carey, who went on to win the election and serve two terms as governor. His days as a public figure were not over, though. He raised funds for Jewish causes and Democratic candidates, and worked as a management consultant, eventually becoming a partner in the Alexander Proudfoot Company. In June 1982, Samuels was named the president of the North American Soccer League.

On October 26, 1984, Samuels died of a heart attack at his home in New York City. His funeral was attended by many leading political figures. He received eulogies from Governor Mario M. Cuomo of New York, Senator Gary Hart of Colorado, Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, and Senator Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut. Former New York governor Malcolm Wilson, once an opponent, remembered him as “a highly principled gentleman with a well-developed civic and social conscience.” Cuomo said that Samuels was “a gentle, compassionate man ...(who) had the instincts, talents, and compassion to have been a great governor.” “He was a better man and a visionary than a politician,” stated journalist Ken Auletta, formerly the director of Samuels’s staff.

References

All the information came from articles in the "New York Times", and one article in the "Wall Street Journal". The "Times" articles are dated Feb. 14, 1968; Jan. 27, 1970; Oct. 29, 1970; Dec. 9, 1971; May 26, 1973; Dec. 22, 1973; May 4, 1975; June 29, 1982; and Oct. 29, 1984. His "New York Times" obituary, dated Oct. 27, 1984, was the source of much of the information. The "Wall Street Journal" article was dated July 1, 1968.