George McAneny (December 24, 1869 – July 29, 1953), was an American newspaperman, municipal reformer and advocate of preservation and city planning from New York City. He served as Manhattan Borough President from 1910 to 1913, President of the New York City Board of Aldermen from 1914 to 1916, and New York City Comptroller in 1933. He also held several other positions throughout his career, serving as an executive officer of the New York City Civil Service Commission in 1902, secretary of the New York Civil Service Reform League (1894-1902), executive manager of The New York Times (1916-1921), and president of the Regional Plan Association (1930-1940).
Biography
McAneny was born on December 24, 1869, in Greenville, New Jersey, the son of George Francis and Katharine (Dillaway) McAneny. graduated from Jersey City High School (since renamed as William L. Dickinson High School) and then reported for The New York World, supporting civil service, city planning and a Bureau of Municipal Research. At different times later in his career he was executive secretary of the New York Civil Service Commission and secretary of the New York Civil Service Reform League (1894–1902). On January 4, 1900, he was married to Marjorie Jacobi, daughter of Mary Putnam and Abraham Jacobi, and with her had six children: Ruth, Herbert, Arnold, Ernst, Elizabeth, and David.
While president of the City Club of New York from 1906 to 1909, he served on the city's charter review commission (1908). He was elected on fusion tickets as Manhattan Borough President in 1909 and as President of the New York City Board of Aldermen in 1913, serving from that position for several months as acting mayor in place of John Purroy Mitchel.
From 1916 to 1921, he was the executive manager of The New York Times and from 1921 to 1926, he chaired the New York State Transit Commission. In 1933, he served briefly as New York City Comptroller before becoming President of the Title Guarantee and Trust Company (1934–1936). After 1920, McAneny was active in several other fields of interest, including city and regional planning (as the first president of the Regional Plan Association from 1930 to 1942), sanitation (at one point as the City's Commissioner of Sanitation), landmarks preservation (as president of the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society from 1942 to 1950), and preparing the 1939 New York World's Fair as chairman of the World's Fair Commission from 1935 to 1936.
He died in Princeton, New Jersey on July 29, 1953.
Accomplishments
In 1911, McAneny became the chairman of a new transit committee of the Board of Estimate. He and the other members worked out a complex compromise with the state Public Service Commission, which had to authorize the franchises, and the railroad companies. Several lines would run through the densest part of Manhattan's core, where high ridership was assured, but they would link to a dozen new and expanded lines running to less developed areas of the outer boroughs. Control of the new lines would be split, and in some cases shared, between the IRT (Interborough Rapid Transit Company) and the BRT (Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company, later reconstructed into the BMT or Brooklyn–Manhattan Transit Corporation). This arrangement, which became known as the Dual Contracts, was approved by the New York Public Service Commission in 1913, while McAneny and his fellow Fusionists were preparing to run for re-election. Over the succeeding years, this plan would result in the extension of subway lines to far-flung areas of the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens, making land accessible for lower-density development that would help disperse the congested population of the inner city.