Meade McClanahan

Meade McClanahan (1894?–1959) was an industrial engineer and businessman who was elected to the Los Angeles City Council in 1945 but was ousted by voters in 1946 based upon his support for controversial preacher and political organizer Gerald L.K. Smith.

A native of Ohio, McClanahan was married to Beulah McClanahan on January 1, 1914, in Chillicothe, Ohio, and moved to Southern California around 1930, where, as an industrial engineer, he operated a foundry at 1423 Riverside Drive. The two separated in October 1954 and were divorced in January 1955 after Beulah McClanahan testified her husband used a "judo cut" on the back of her neck after watching wrestling on television. Mrs. McClanahan got the family home at 2325 Riverside Terrace at Riverside Drive, and her husband kept his business, the Ace Tank and Boiler Company of Maywood, California, which he operated with a son, Bernard.

He died at the age of 65 on October 5, 1959 of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's disease) after a long illness, in Glendale, leaving a wife, Alice Moore, an attorney; two sons, Bernard E. McClanahan of Whittier and Thomas Meade McClanahan of Los Angeles; and a daughter, Beverly N. Cabral of Los Angeles. Burial was at Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale.

McClanahan ran for the Los Angeles School Board in 1939. At that time he was sponsoring a radio program, "Los Angeles Speaks," which opposed the political activities of political figure Clifford E. Clinton.

In February 1939, McClanahan was president of the Riverside Drive District Business Men's Association. In that year he was sued, along with two others, by Clifford E. Clinton on a charge of criminal libel for having sponsored a radio program that attacked Clinton and for helping to publish a booklet that referred to Clinton as "Der Los Angeles Fuehrer." He and the other defendants were acquitted in a jury trial. Clinton also filed a civil suit for defamation; it was dismissed in 1945 because Clinton did not proceed with the action.

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