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1959: The natural vs. the athlete

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By GARY R. MORMINO

Tribune correspondent

Published: November 15, 2009

Fifty years ago, Tampa heaved a sigh of relief at the end of one of its greatest political campaigns. The 1959 mayor's race may have lacked the fisticuffs and fireworks of D.B. McKay and R.E.L. Chancey's contest in 1935, but it featured two talented and contrasting candidates who voters greatly liked and disliked.

The beloved politician

Nick Chillura Nuccio, the son of Italian immigrants, was born on Eighth Avenue in Ybor City in 1901. He dropped out of school in the eighth grade. His wife, Concetta, was the daughter of Italian-immigrant powerbroker Filippo Licata. She may have set an unofficial record for preparing the most chicken-dinner fundraisers of any political spouse in history.

Nuccio was a natural politician, before the term was negative. Between his election as city alderman in 1929 and his final year as mayor in 1967, he was one of the most beloved politicians in Tampa history. Many Tampa residents, however, depicted him as an out-of-date machine politician.

Nuccio's philosophy was simple: Government should exert a positive role in people's lives. To Nuccio, this principle was best exemplified in concrete. Today, one can still see the fading remnants of Nuccio's largesse: paved driveways and concrete park benches, all stamped, "Nick C. Nuccio, County Commissioner."

The dream candidate
Julian Lane represented everything Nick Nuccio was not. He was born in Seminole Heights in 1914. His family had come to Tampa from Georgia in the 1890s; his wife Frances' family had arrived in the 1860s. The Lanes ran a family dairy.

A baseball star at Hillsborough High School, Lane went on to be captain of the football team at the University of Florida. He explained what that meant: In 1933, a "scholarship" provided him a job waiting tables.

The decorated war veteran returned home to Tampa on Jan. 1, 1946, anxious to resume his career as a dairy farmer. But domestic duty called.

The rise of Nuccio

In 1955, Nuccio challenged popular Mayor Curtis Hixon. Days before the election, national columnist Drew Pearson wrote a sensational story alleging that Nuccio had ties with the Mafia. Hixon easily triumphed, by 9,000 votes.

Nuccio's window of opportunity had passed, or so it seemed. In 1954, Tampa annexed Sulphur Springs, Palma Ceia and the Interbay peninsula, adding 91,000 residents. Young war veterans such as Sam Gibbons, Chester Ferguson, John Germany and Lane symbolized Tampa's future.

In 1956, Hixon died in office, and J.L. Young, president of the Board of Representatives, became interim mayor. In a special election, Nuccio eked out a 125-vote victory, becoming the first Latin mayor of Tampa.

Perhaps no one in Tampa enjoyed governing as much as the happy warrior from Ybor City. From his third-floor office in City Hall, he did not so much lord over Tampa as revel in the small details: giving trinkets to children, having cafe con leche every morning at Los Cuervos on Seventh Avenue, wearing his signature black homburg and smoking enormous Tampa cigars, and bringing friends home to enjoy Concetta's cooking, then dismissing them to take an early afternoon nap.

The battle for City Hall

In 1959, Nuccio announced that he would run for re-election. Lane initially announced that he was a candidate for city council, but "friends encouraged me to run for mayor, so I switched."

Lane emphasized honest government and sound business practices. He especially criticized the city's purchase of 4.4 acres of railroad-owned property along the Hillsborough River for $2.5 million. The Tampa Tribune labeled the Nuccio deal with Atlantic Coast Line the "Great Train Robbery." The land became the site for Curtis Hixon Auditorium.

Nuccio smarted from criticism he considered unfair at best and insensitive at worst. "Newspapers didn't like my name, didn't like where I lived," Nuccio remembered. Upon his victory in 1956, the Tribune had editorialized, "History has bestowed upon Mr. Nuccio the long-coveted opportunity to show that he can rise above the level of ward politician and make a mayor of which the whole city can be proud." In 1959, the Tribune concluded that Nuccio had governed badly and endorsed Lane.

Two televised debates did not help Nuccio, whose accent only accentuated stylistic differences between the candidates.

Lane easily defeated Nuccio in a runoff, 37,823 to 32,910. Nuccio drew strong support in Ybor City, West Tampa and other minority neighborhoods, but Lane won by massive margins in Sulphur Springs, Seminole Heights, South Tampa and the Interbay area.

Always a new challenge

Voters can be cruel and mercurial. Four years later, Lane defended his administration against challenger Nuccio. The mayor's term had been tumultuous; a civil rights revolution and social unrest roiled the political waters from 1959 to 1963. Voters also blamed Lane for flooding along the Hillsborough River.

Ironically, Nuccio became the master of television (ably advised by Poe Insurance executives), using commercials to poke fun at Lane. On Election Day in 1963, nature proved as influential as electronics. Nuccio's faithful Latin constituency braved rain and high winds to provide their candidate with a winning margin of 2,000 votes.

Four years later, the political warhorse Nuccio was unseated by a new rising force in Tampa politics: the youthful and irrepressible Dick Greco.

Gary R. Mormino is director of the Florida Studies Program at USF St. Petersburg. In the early 1980s, he interviewed Julian Lane, Nick and Concetta Nuccio, and executives at Poe Insurance. Reach him by e-mail at gmormino @mail.usf.edu or in care of the Fl

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