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Harold J. Crawford

American politician, lawyer, and judge (1900–1973)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 23, 2026
Entity authorityQ140468002 ↗
Source-derived summary

Harold J. Crawford (February 28, 1900 – June 16, 1973) was an American politician, lawyer, and judge from New York City.

Early life and education

Crawford was born on February 28, 1900, in Manhattan, New York City. He lived in Jamaica Estates, Queens, for much of his later life.

He graduated from Fordham Preparatory School, Fordham University, and Fordham University School of Law. He was admitted to the bar in 1923 and practiced law from 1923 to 1935.

Political career

Crawford was elected to the New York State Assembly in 1933 as a Democrat-Liberal, representing Queens County's 1st District. He served from 1933 to 1935.

During his time in the Assembly, he co-sponsored the bills that created the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority, the Queens-Midtown Tunnel Authority, and the Feld-Crawford Fair Trade Act. The Feld-Crawford Fair Trade Act, which became law in May 1935, permitted manufacturers of trademarked or branded goods to set minimum resale prices for retailers.

Judicial career

In February 1935, Crawford was elected as a municipal court judge in Queens.

Editorial summary

“Harold J. Crawford” enters the record as american politician, lawyer, and judge (1900–1973). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Harold, Crawford and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1900, 1973, 1923, 1935—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1900-01-01. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Harold, Crawford and American.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Harold J. Crawford” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Harold, Crawford and American provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q140468002. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1900, 1973, 1923 and 1935.

Critical limits

Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Harold J. Crawford”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Harold J. Crawford primary sources, Harold J. Crawford archive and Harold research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Harold J. Crawford”?
  2. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
  3. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Harold J. Crawford” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.