United States House of Representatives: History, Art, & Archives
Search the website

MCCRARY, George Washington

1835–1890

Office

Representative

State/Territory

Iowa

Party

Republican

Congress(es)

41st (1869–1871), 42nd (1871–1873), 43rd (1873–1875), 44th (1875–1877)

Leadership Positions

Republican Conference Chair - 44th

Jump To

Biography

McCRARY, George Washington, a Representative from Iowa; born near Evansville, Vanderburg County, Ind., August 29, 1835; moved to the Territory of Iowa in 1836 with his parents, who settled in Van Buren County; attended the public schools; studied law; was admitted to the bar in 1856 and commenced practice in Keokuk, Iowa; member of the State house of representatives in 1857; served in the State senate in 1861-1865; elected as a Republican to the Forty-first and to the three succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1869-March 3, 1877); chairman, Committee on Elections (Forty-second Congress), Committee on Railways and Canals (Forty-third Congress); was not a candidate for renomination in 1876; Secretary of War in the Cabinet of President Hayes from March 12, 1877, to December 11, 1879, when he resigned; served as United States judge of the eighth judicial circuit 1880-1884; moved to Kansas City, Mo.; became general counsel for the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad Co. in 1884; died in St. Joseph, Mo., June 23, 1890; interment in Oakland Cemetery, Keokuk, Iowa.

View Record in the Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress

[ Top ]

External Research Collections

Jackson County Historical Society

Independence, MO
Papers: In McCrary family papers, 1877-1921. 2 boxes and 1 reel of microfilm. Chiefly family papers with little congressional material.

New-York Historical Society

New York, NY
Papers: April 7, 1877; January 16 and May 8, 1879. 3 letters. Official correspondence. Finding aid in repository.

State Historical Society of Iowa

Des Moines, IA
Papers: 1872-1874. 1 folder. Personal and business papers and photographs. Also one letter in Alonzo Abernethy collection.
[ Top ]

Bibliography / Further Reading

McCrary, George Washington. The evils of the civil service and the remedy. [Washington: Printed at the Congressional Globe Office, 1872].

------. Improvement of the mouth of the Mississippi River. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1874.

------. The political issues of the time. Washington, D.C.: National Republican Publishing Company, 1878.

------. A treatise on the American law of elections. Keokuk, Iowa: R.B. Ogden. Chicago: E.B. Myers, 1875. Revised, Chicago: Callaghan & Co., 1897.

[ Top ]
Office of the Historian: history@mail.house.gov
Office of Art & Archives, Office of the Clerk: art@mail.house.gov, archives@mail.house.gov