James C. Gardner
| James C. Gardner | |
|---|---|
James Creswell Gardner's swearing in as the mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana (1954)
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| Mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana | |
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In office November 9, 1954 – 1958 |
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| Preceded by | Clyde Edward Fant, Sr. |
| Succeeded by | Clyde Edward Fant, Sr. |
| Shreveport City Council, District B member | |
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In office 1978–1982 |
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| Preceded by | New position |
| Succeeded by | Dee Peterson |
| State Representative from Caddo Parish (at-large) | |
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In office 1952–1954 |
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| Preceded by | Edwin Ford Hunter, Jr. |
| Succeeded by | Frank Fulco, Sr. |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
James Creswell Gardner June 17, 1924 Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, USA |
| Died | August 27, 2010 (aged 86) Shreveport, Louisiana |
| Resting place | Forest Park East Cemetery in Shreveport |
| Nationality | American |
| Political party | Democratic Party |
| Spouse(s) |
(1) Mary Ella Buchanan Gardner (married 1944-1976, her death) |
| Children |
Ellen Buchanan Gardner Caverlee |
| Occupation | Power company executive |
| Religion | United Methodist |
| Military service | |
| Service/branch | United States Army |
| Rank | Second lieutenant |
| Battles/wars | European Theater of Operations |
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(1) For most of the half century since he was mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana, Jim Gardner has been known as "Mr. Shreveport" because of his civic and community activities. (2) Gardner wrote his memoirs of Shreveport, personal and political, in two volumes that cover much of the city's growth during his lifetime. |
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(1) Mary Ella Buchanan Gardner (married 1944-1976, her death)
Ellen Buchanan Gardner Caverlee
James C. "Cres" Gardner, II Stepdaughters:
Martha Elizabeth Hannigan
Margaret Welsh Clausen
(1) For most of the half century since he was mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana, Jim Gardner has been known as "Mr. Shreveport" because of his civic and community activities.
James Creswell Gardner, I, known as Jim Gardner (July 17, 1924 – August 27, 2010), was a power company executive best known as the mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana, who served a single term from 1954 to 1958.
Sometimes called Shreveport's "First Citizen," Jim Gardner was twenty-nine when elected mayor and thirty when he assumed the office. His progressive and independent politics in a decade of general conservatism may have impacted his defeat for a second term in 1958 by fellow Democrat Clyde Edward Fant, Sr.
In 1959, Gardner joined the administration of Southwestern Electric Power Company, which serves parts of Louisiana, Arkansas, and Texas. He retired as company vice president in 1987. He penned a two-volume personal and political autobiography of his life in Shreveport, entitled Jim Gardner and Shreveport (Ritz Publications of Shreveport). Vol. I covers 1924 to1958; Vol. II, 1959 to 2006.
Gardner was born in Shreveport to Arvill Pitt "Jack" Gardner and the former Marie Creswell. His maternal grandfather, James Pleasants Creswell, owned the former Creswell Hotel in Shreveport. James Creswell's wife died when daughter Marie was an adolescent, and he did not remarry. Instead, father and daughter worked together in the management of the hotel. Arvill Gardner, born in 1892 in Carroll County, Tennessee, moved to Shreveport in 1914. After his marriage to Marie, the couple operated the former Gardner Hotel in the 400 block of Milam Street in downtown Shreveport. Jack Gardner subsequently died in a house fire. James Gardner's maternal great-grandmother, Julia Pleasants Creswell, the mother of James Pleasants Creswell, wrote several books about life in the American Civil War era, one called Callamura, an autobiographical novel first published when she and her husband, Judge David Creswell (Gardner's great-grandfather), lived in Greenwood, a Caddo Parish community west of Shreveport. Callamura was republished by Ritz Publications in 2003, after a copy was found dormant in a library in Indiana.
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