--- description: To chesty Peter J. Crotty, 51, the future must have seemed cheery. As the Democratic boss of New York's Erie County (Buffalo), he delivered bountifully for Jack Kennedy in 1960 and got the new... title: Nation: Shuffle Off in Buffalo image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [U.S.](/section/us/) # Nation: Shuffle Off in Buffalo by [TIME](/author/time/) Nov 17, 1961 5:00 AM CUT by [TIME](/author/time/) Nov 17, 1961 5:00 AM CUT To chesty Peter J. Crotty, 51, the future must have seemed cheery. As the Democratic boss of New York’s Erie County (Buffalo), he delivered bountifully for Jack Kennedy in 1960 and got the new President’s heartfelt thanks in person at the White House. Soon word was passed that Crotty was a Kennedy favorite to replace bumbling Michael H. Prendergast as New York State Democratic chairman—might even aspire to becoming national chairman one day. And then came last week’s election in Buffalo. A Crotty protėgé. Democratic Mayor Frank A. Sedita, had been beaten in the primary by Democratic Councilman Victor E. Manz. Crotty refused to back Manz in the general election; instead he openly supported Sedita, who ran as an independent. With the Democrats angrily split, Buffalo elected Chester Kowal as its first Republican mayor in eight years. Instead of the familiar thanks of victory, Peter Crotty heard irate Democratic demands: get out, get out. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6872381/nation-shuffle-off-in-buffalo/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6872381/nation-shuffle-off-in-buffalo/"},"headline":"Nation: Shuffle Off in Buffalo","datePublished":"1961-11-17T05:00:00.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-13T22:15:04.149Z","description":"To chesty Peter J. Crotty, 51, the future must have seemed cheery. As the Democratic boss of New York's Erie County (Buffalo), he delivered bountifully for Jack Kennedy in 1960 and got the new...","url":"https://time.com/archive/6872381/nation-shuffle-off-in-buffalo/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME","url":"https://time.com/author/time/"}],"articleSection":"U.S.","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/us/","name":"U.S."}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/archive/6872381/nation-shuffle-off-in-buffalo/","name":"Nation: Shuffle Off in Buffalo"}}]}] ```