Ira Clifton COPLEY, Congress, IL (1864-1947)

COPLEY, Ira Clifton, (nephew of Richard Henry Whiting), a Representative from Illinois; born near Galesburg, Knox County, Ill., October 25, 1864; moved with his parents to Aurora, Ill., in 1867; attended the public schools and Jennings Seminary at Aurora; was graduated from Yale University in 1887 and from the Union College of Law at Chicago in 1889; became connected with the gas and electric business in Aurora, Ill., in 1889; owner and publisher of the Beacon-News at Aurora in 1905, the Courier-News at Elgin in 1908, and the Herald-News at Joliet in 1913; elected as a Republican to the Sixty-second and Sixty-third Congresses; reelected as a Progressive to the Sixty-fourth Congress and as a Republican to the Sixty-fifth through Sixty-seventh Congresses (March 4, 1911-March 3, 1923); was not a candidate for renomination in 1922; continued the development and publishing of daily newspapers, acquiring the Illinois State Journal at Springfield, the Union and the Tribune at San Diego, Calif., and eleven other dailies in southern California; died in Aurora, Ill., November 1, 1947; interment in Spring Lake Cemetery.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present