James Chase color photo.jpg

ID: 5273 ~ Source: Image Courtesy of Spokane Public Library

This file appears in: Mayor James Chase: The First Black Mayor of Spokane had a Humble Beginning

Chase smiling in his mayoral victory, c. 1981

This file appears in: Mayor James Chase: The First Black Mayor of Spokane had a Humble Beginning

Mayor James Chase: The First Black Mayor of Spokane had a Humble Beginning

Born in 1914 to a working-class African American family in dusty Wharton, Texas, James E. Chase might not have seemed like a future mayor. The youngest of seven, money was right in his family,…