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Lawrence J. Fitzgerald

American businessman and politician

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 revisionApr 21, 2026
Entity authorityQ6504192
Source-derived summary

Lawrence J. Fitzgerald (d. July 12, 1918 Auburn, Cayuga County, New York) was an American businessman and politician.

Life

He was born in Ireland and came to the United States as a boy with his parents. The family settled at Skaneateles, N.Y. Later he moved to Cortland, New York and in 1869, he established the Cortland Wagon Company which manufactured carriages, wagons and bicycles.

He was President of the Village of Cortland in 1882. As a Democrat, he was New York State Treasurer from 1886 to 1889, elected in 1885 and 1887.

In 1906, in opposition to William R. Hearst who had been nominated by the Democratic Party, he supported Republican Charles Evans Hughes for Governor.

He was a vice president of the National Bank of Cortland, and a director of the Madison Square Bank and the Columbia Bank, both in New York City.

Sources

The Political Graveyard: Index to Politicians: Fitzgerald at politicalgraveyard.com Political Graveyard

Past and Present - Cortland - Part 2 - Its Manufacturing Interests.

Editorial summary

“Lawrence J. Fitzgerald” enters the record as american businessman and politician. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Lawrence, Fitzgerald and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1918, 1869, 1882, 1886—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1850. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Lawrence, Fitzgerald and American.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Lawrence J. Fitzgerald” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Lawrence, Fitzgerald 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 Apr 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6504192. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1918, 1869, 1882 and 1886.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. 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 “Lawrence J. Fitzgerald”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Lawrence J. Fitzgerald primary sources, Lawrence J. Fitzgerald archive and Lawrence 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 “Lawrence J. Fitzgerald”?
  2. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Lawrence J. Fitzgerald” 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.