John Randolph Hoxie
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John Randolph Hoxie was a Quaker, Democratic politician, bank executive, cattle rancher, co-founder of Chicago's Union Stockyards and member of the Chicago Stock Exchange. He is the namesake of Hoxie Boulevard in Chicago and Hoxie, TX. Two of his mansions remain at 4440 South Michigan Avenue in Chicago and in San Gabriel, TX. His first cousin was fellow Quaker abolitionist and railroad manager Herbert Melville Hoxie, nicknamed "Hub."
Born in 1831 in Macedon, New York to New England Quakers Cornelius and Anna (nee Brownell) Hoxie, John graduated from the Macedon Academy for Boys in 1848[1] before moving west to Michigan where he began working in livestock and stockyards. He moved west again at age 28 and settled in Chicago in 1859 and worked as a manager at the Lake Shore Road stock yards through the Civil War.[citation needed]
Gilded Age Chicago
In 1873, Hoxie married Mary J. Hamilton, the daughter of Chicago pioneer, Polemus D. Hamilton. John and Mary Hoxie built a home on land he developed in Hyde Park at 4440 S. Michigan Avenue and Gustavus Swift built a mansion across the street in 1890, both of which still stand as of 2021. Mary Hoxie stayed in the home until she died in 1924. Hoxie thrived in post-war Chicago, first as a manager for the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad, then as a co-founder of the Union Stock Yards, a President of the Stock Yards National Bank and active in city politics as a Democrat.[2]
Hoxie for Congress
John R. Hoxie entered the Democratic convention seeking the 1876 nomination for Illinois' 1st Congressional District in an open seat race against Republican William Aldrich. The progressive news coverage of the day implies Hoxie's candidacy was "bled" by Chicago's machine politics once it was known Hoxie was spending his own considerable fortune to secure delegates.[3]