Identifier: newyorkstatesprov2harr (find matches)
Title: New York State's prominent and progressive men : an encyclopaedia of contemporaneous biography
Year: 1900 (1900s)
Authors: Harrison, Mitchell Charles, 1870-
Subjects: Civic leaders
Publisher: (New York) : New York Tribune
Contributing Library: Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
Digitizing Sponsor: Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center

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f Tammany Hall; yethe continued to be the personal friend of John Kelly, then headof the latter body. In 1882 he served a term in the State As-sembly, and was the author of several important laws, includingthat regulating monthly tenancies, which closely affects thewelfare of more than one hundred thousand families in this city. Mr. Breen played an important part in the development ofwhat is now the borough of the Bronx. When, after annexa-tion, it was neglected by Manhattan politicians, he was one ofthe chief organizers of the Citizens Local Improvement party,which elected Louis J. Heintz Commissioner of Street Improve-ments for those wards; and he also served for two years as coun-sel to the Taxpayers Association, which, through his effortsbefore the Legislature and elsewhere, effected the establishmentof the Department of Street Improvements, and opened a wayfor the growth of the sparsely populated annexed district intothe populous and attractive borough it now is. When grateful 28
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i MATTHEW P. BEEEN 29 property-owners and business men wanted to give him a testi-monial purse of five thousand dollars, Mr. Breen declined it,though he proudly accepted a set of eulogistic resolutions. Mr. Breen, in the Assembly of 1882, presented and secured thepassage of a resolution appointing a committee of five, of whichhe was chairman, and of which Theodore Roosevelt, presentGovernor, was an associate member, to examine into the ad-visability of establishing public parks and parade-grounds for theNational Guard in the Twenty-third and Twenty-fourth wards.The committee reported in favor of the project, and its recom-mendations led to the establishment of the magnificent chain ofparks in that portion of the city. Finally, he was prominentamong the advocates of the consolidation of Brooklyn andother municipalities with New York. For six years Mr. Breen was a school trustee of the SeventhWard, and he has long been a friend of public education. He isan authority on corporation and m

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