The Kenneth E. Reeves Papers and Digital Collection is Now Available

Photo of Ken Reeves’ first campaign office, 1983

We are pleased to announce that the Kenneth E. Reeves Papers, 1982-2019 is now available for research. A selection of digitized material is also available.

Biography
Kenneth E. Reeves was born in 1951 in Detroit, Michigan and first moved to Cambridge to study at Harvard University as an undergraduate. He graduated from Harvard in 1973. After attending law school at the University of Michigan, Reeves returned to Cambridge and practiced as a lawyer while becoming involved in local politics. In 1990, Reeves was elected to the Cambridge City Council and later served as the city’s mayor between 1992-1995 and 2006-2008. When first elected mayor, Reeves became the first openly gay African American mayor in the United States.

During his time on the city council, Reeves was a member of the Cambridge Civics Association Slate and the Working Committee for a Cambridge Rainbow.

Collection Overview
Ranging from 1982-2019, this collection contains documents, photographs, and ephemera from Kenneth Reeves’ campaigns, terms as councilor and mayor, and personal life. The first two series of this collection contain a large range of campaign material, clippings and stories from local and national magazine and newspapers about Reeves, a small number of agenda from meetings, and a small number of photographs. The third series, composed of Reeves’ personal items, contains a large number of photographs of St. Paul AME Church’s Christmas performance of the Messiah from 1982 and 1983, as well as two portraits of Reeves, one painted by local citizen Al Sayles and one by acclaimed artist Gale Fulton Ross.

Exhibition: The Uncompromising Political Career of Alice K. Wolf

Exhibition:  The Uncompromising Political Career of Alice K. Wolf
August 14- September 10, 2023
Main Library, Lobby and Second Floor

In 1939, at the age of five, Alice K Wolf and her parents, Frederick and Renee Koerner, fled Nazi Austria and arrived in Cambridge, seeking a stable life where they would not be threatened for being Jewish.  Although the family soon settled in Brighton, 51 years later, Wolf became Cambridge’s first Jewish Mayor. 

Wolf felt that the injustice and fear she experienced as a child under the Nazi regime shaped the kind of politician she would later become:  a public servant committed to “equity and to fairness of the government.”*  Wolf, a champion of progressive ideals, spent her political career as an advocate for the rights of women, minorities, refugees, renters, children, students, and the LGBTQ+ community. 

After graduating from Boston’s Girls Latin School and Simmons College, she married Robert Wolf, moved to Cambridge, and had two sons, Eric and Adam.  Wolf spent the next 20 years of her career in the research and software development field: first as an applied psychology researcher at MIT’s Lincoln Laboratories and later as a personnel director for the Computer Corporation of America based in Kendall Square. 

Wolf entered politics slowly as a concerned parent and member of the PTA.  In 1973, she decided to run for School Committee and was elected.  She served for eight years until she ran unsuccessfully for City Council in 1981.  But she won in the next election cycle and, served five terms between 1984 and 1994, include two years as Mayor from 1990-1991.  In 1996, Wolf won a seat in the Massachusetts House of Representatives, serving Cambridge and surrounding communities for 16 years. 

Alice Wolf died in her home in Cambridge on January 26, 2023 at the age of 89.  The Library is hosting a tribute to Wolf on September 9th at 2 pm. 

*”Go Ask Alice:  Cambridge’s ‘High Priestess of P.C.,'” Sunday People, Boston Sunday Herald, 12 December 1993, p. 6-9.

New York Mayoral Candidate a Cambridge Native

Bill de Blasio’s 1979 yearbook identified him as “future president of the U.S.A. — the Untied Sneakers Association.’’

Did you know that New York City Democratic Mayoral Candidate Bill de Blasio grew up in Cambridge and graduated from Cambridge Rindge and Latin in 1979?  Back then he was known as Bill Wilhelm and he was already espousing progressive politics.  There was a great article about his formative years in Cambridge published by the Boston Globe on September 30th.  Read it here and learn why the future New York City mayor may be a Red Sox fan.