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From Sherif.{ to Cook County Board President· FOUR Decades after Ogilvie's governorship, Brian Whalen could not resist now and then sitting back in his office at Navistar International Transportation Corporation in Chicago's NBC Tower to reflect on his years as Ogilvie's righthand man. From start to finish of Ogilvie's political career, all ten years of it, Whalen was his top administrative assistant. He kept the machinery of the governor's office well oiled, and his hand was in everything from policy matters to logistics . He was the gatekeeper to Ogilvie's inner sanctum. People in the administration knew him as the chief of staff for the governor. In the outside world, Whalen was accorded the lofty title of deputy governor, which was quite impressive to governmental groupies, if for no other reason than the fact of Whalen's age, twenty-nine. After Ogilvie's election, Whalen accompanied his boss on a visit to Springfield to work out details for the transition to the governor's office. Landing in the capital, Ogilvie and Whalen were met by state troopers anxious to attend to the transportation and other needs of the governor-elect. As Ogilvie and Whalen were being chauffeured into the heart of the city, Ogilvie turned to his young aide, smiled ever so slightly, and quietly asked, "Do you think we can get used to this?" Whalen answered with a nod and a smile of his own.I What was there to say? After all, it was a question that only someone like Whalen would fully appreciate, certainly more so than the hundreds of other persons just then latching onto Ogilvie's political star. The first time Whalen met Ogilvie, the future governor was sitting alone in his campaign office. The year was 1962, and Ogilvie was the Republican candidate for sheriff of Cook County. Ogilvie's campaign office was situated in the old laSalle Hotel in downtown Chicago, and Whalen happened to be spending time in the LaSalle that year while working on another political campaign. One day Whalen decided to break the ice and seek out Ogilvie. "I had made up my mind to go and meet him, and to offer to help him where I could," related Whalen. "I found him sitting by himself in his campaign office 38 FROM SHERIFF TO COOK COUNTY BOARD PRESIDENT . 39 in the hotel. Ijust walked in and introduced myself." Although expecting only a brief round of small talk, Whalen ended up conversing with Ogilvie for two hours.2 Afterward, Whalen felt that Ogilvie "had shown more depth to me than any public official or candidate I'd encountered. When I left him that first time, I really believed he would win the sheriff's race and that, before he was done, he'd be elected governor of Illinois. I told that to some of my friends, and they thought I was crazy." Unlike many men and women in public office or running for it, Ogilvie actually listened as much as he talked. Probing Whalen about his background, Ogilvie learned a lot about the fresh-faced young man who had stopped to say hello: Whalen had obtained aJesuit education, first at Loyola Academy on Chicago 's north side and then at Loyola University in the city, where Whalen majored in social science. Whalen was a grandson of Dr. Charles Whalen, a former Chicago health commissioner, lawyer, and writer as well as a personal physician to more than one Chicago mayor. Dr. Whalen also was a Democrat, though Brian's father, an early promoter of the automatic laundry machine business, was not. He influenced his son to become a Republican, and so he was, even before he started to shave. In I952, at the Republican National Convention in the International Amphitheater in Chicago, twelve-year-old Brian Whalen paraded around hoisting a .sign promoting the nomination of Senator Robert A. Taft of Ohio for president because Whalen "had decided on my own that Taft was a political leader I could believe in."3 However, the convention nominated General Dwight David Eisenhower for president instead. While at Loyola University, Whalen had organized a young Republicans' club. During the 1960 presidential race, Whalen campaigned for Vice President Richard Nixon at the Loyola campus, a Catholic school with a strong student backing for Senator John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts, a Catholic and Democrat . Whalen, a year later, was elected president of the Illinois Young Republican Federation, and in 1962, he led...

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