Background
Lomasney was born in Boston, Massachusetts, to Maurice Lomasney and Mary Murray, immigrants from Ireland who had fled the potato famine.
Lomasney was born in Boston, Massachusetts, to Maurice Lomasney and Mary Murray, immigrants from Ireland who had fled the potato famine.
He served as state senator, state representative, and alderman. Lomasney, known as the "Mahatma", was best remembered, however, for being the ward boss (political boss) of Boston"s Ward Eight. Lomasney left school when he was in the eighth grade.
He then became the leader of a local Irish street gang, and he worked as a bootblack.
Lomasney later befriended a local Democratic ward boss and he worked as a lamplighter and a health inspector. On March 7, 1894 Lomasney received a bullet wound in the leg in an unsuccessful assassination attempt.
His assailant, James A. Dunan, blamed Lomasney for a dispute he had with the Boston Board of Health. In 1916 the Massachusetts legislature and electorate approved a calling of a Constitutional Convention.
Lomasney created a famous saying on the importance of discretion: "Never write if you can speak.
Never speak if you can nod. Never nod if you can wink."
A street named Lomasney Way in Boston is named after him.
In May 1917 Lomasney was elected to serve as a member of the Massachusetts Constitutional Convention of 1917, representing the 5th Suffolk District of the Massachusetts House of Representatives.
