Isaac Smith Kalloch was born in Rockport, Maine. He became a Baptist minister at age 18, and records show that he married that same year. He and his wife moved to Boston where, at over 6 feet tall and with broad shoulders and flaming red hair, he gained the reputation of being a magnetic presence and brilliant orator. Things went south when, in 1863, he was brought to trial for committing the punishable offense of adultry with the wife of a friend. The closely-followed trial ended in a hung jury, and the prosecution opted not to retry the case. Kalloch quickly moved from Boston to the Ottawa Indian territory in Kansas. He negotiated the exchange of 20,000 acres of Indian land on which the town of Ottawa was built in return for a school for American Indians. This school eventually became Ottawa University. Kalloch founded the Second Baptist Church where he was pastor for a short time, and he was instrumental in bringing the railroad to the town four years later.
Kalloch moved to San Francisco in 1875. He was pastor at the Metropolitan Temple Church where he endorsed the Workingmen’s Party of California. In 1879 the organization endorsed and funded his run for mayor. Charles and Michael de Young, founders and chief editors of the San Francisco Chronicle[1], supported Kalloch’s opponent in the mayoral race. Charles in particular questioned the moral character of Kalloch’s deceased father. In retaliation, Kalloch insinuated from the pulpit that the de Young brothers’ mother was a former prostitute. The San Francisco Sun, a competitor to The Chronicle, published the story. Charles de Young hunted down the Sun editor, resulting in a shootout in the middle of Market Street[2]. The editors missed each other, but a young child was shot in the leg. The Chronicle paid the boy’s family $100 and the matter was dropped.
Charles then went after Kalloch. He waited in a closed carriage outside Kalloch’s church. When Kalloch left the building, Charles shot him in the chest and thigh. When news broke that Kalloch’s life was in peril, Charles sought refuge at the City Jail from an outraged mob. Kalloch survived and it is believed that it was the sympathy vote that got him elected as the 18th mayor of San Francisco. Charles forfeited bail and moved East for a time until things died down. When he returned, however, he published a pamphlet accusing Kalloch of adultery. It was Kalloch’s son, Isaac Milton Kalloch, who sought revenge. Kalloch Jr. was a minister like his father and assigned to the Emmanuel Baptist Church on Capp and 22nd. The church had a troubling history: its two previous ministers had both committed suicide. On April 23, 1880 Kalloch Jr. entered the old Chronicle Building on Market and shot Charles de Young, hitting him in the neck and killing him instantly. Kalloch Jr. was found not guilty of murder, though several witnesses in the trial were later jailed for perjury. Kalloch Sr. would also end up in court that year on bribery charges, but he was also acquitted.
After finishing his 2-year term as mayor, Kalloch Sr. moved north to the Washington Territory. He died a few years later of diabetes at age 55. Kalloch Jr. eventually became a successful attorney in Oakland. He would marry and have two daughters. The beleaguered Emmanuel Baptist Church, now having had two pastors who committed suicide and one pastor who committed murder, relocated their church to Bartlett Street to make a clean start. It no longer exists. Michael de Young became a leading and respected member of society, later establishing the de Young Museum[3].
[1] San Francisco Chronicle: see story coming January 16th
[2] Market Street: story coming July 26th
[3] De Young Museum: see story coming March 23rd
