Life and Background

-Chester Alan Arthur was born on October 5, 1829 in Fairfield, Vermont.

-His father, William Arthur, was an abolitionist preacher who moved his family from one Baptist parish to the next throughout New York and Vermont.

-He was born to comparative poverty in a log cabin.

-Chester Alan Arthur and Ellen Lewis Herndon married on October 25, 1859.

-Their first son, born in 1860, died at age two from a brain disease.

-The couple had two more children- a son in 1864 and a daughter in 1871.

-Arthur's daughter was named after his wife, Ellen Herndon.

-His son was named Chester Alan Arthur Jr.

-At the early age of 42, only twenty months before Arthur became President, Ellen died of pneumonia.

-Arthur had a memorial for Ellen - a stained glassed window installed in St. John's Episcopal Church within view of his office so at night he could look at it.

-Early in the Civil War he served as Quartermaster General of the State of New York.

-He graduated from Union College in 1848.

-While in college, he was known as the "leader of pranks"

-After graduation he went on to study law.

-His most famous case was his suit against a Brooklyn streetcar company for forcibly ejecting a black woman from a whites only street car. This case resulted in the desegregation of New York's public transportation system.

-Arthur became active in New York Republican politics, and in 1867, rose to become chairperson of the Executive Committee of the State Republican Committee.