William McKinley was the 25th president of the United States. He was elected to a second term in 1900, but was assassinated in 1901 by legally insane anarchist Leon Czolgosz.

Czolgosz, shot the president on August 13, 1901 in Buffalo, NY. He met the electric chair on October 29, 1901. His personal effects and letters were burned, sulfuric acid was thrown into his coffin and 12 hours later everything that was Leon Czolgosz disappeared from this earth. What did McKinley leave behind?

The McKinley presidency itself left little legacy, but the era it ushered in changed the lives of every American since – The Progressive Age – an era of modernization, reform and increased government activity.

McKinley was a “Christian gentleman” devoted to his faith, his appearance, and his severely neurotic, epileptic wife. His care for her is said to be so great that he put all other husbands in Washington to shame. After being shot, as he witnessed Leon Czolgosz being beaten senseless by guards, he said “Don’t let them hurt him.” Then he turned to his secretary and said “My wife, be carful how you tell her.” In spite of her serious condition, he never left her.

But was it this caring nature that won McKinley the victory of William Jennings Bryan, the Democratic nominee from Nebraska, in 1897? No. In what is considered the first modern election, the McKinley campaign spent 3 million on literature and propaganda, most sent to minorities. Then surrogate speakers went out and spoke for McKinley while he sat in his Canton, Ohio home and welcomed daily visitors onto his lawn where he literally gave speeches from his front porch.

Bryan, one of the most popular speakers in American history, spent $600,000, crisscrossed the country logging nearly 20,000 miles and spoke to 5 million people. Bryan lost to McKinley in 1897, 1900 and Taft in 1908.

When the delusional Czolgosz shot McKinley, he hoped to effectively loosen the grip of the rich elite on the lower classes. His assassination had no effect, as then Vice President Theodore Roosevelt would step into McKinley’s presidential shoes and carry progressive reform even further, much further than his predecessor.

William McKinley was the first president to be extensively video taped. View video in the Wikimedia Commons

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