Frederick Norton Goddard (1861, New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 – 28 May 1905, Litchfield, Connecticut

Litchfield, Connecticut

Litchfield is a town in and former county seat of Litchfield County, Connecticut, United States, and is known as an affluent summer resort. The population was 8,316 at the 2000 census. The boroughs of Bantam and Litchfield are located within the town...

) was a Republican Party

Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

 politician

Politician

A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...

 from New York City.

Biography

A descendent of the first wagon master general of the Army under the command of George Washington

George Washington

George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...

 (John Goddard of Brookline, Massachusetts

Brookline, Massachusetts

Brookline is a town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States, which borders on the cities of Boston and Newton. As of the 2010 census, the population of the town was 58,732.-Etymology:...

) and the son of one of the wealthiest merchants in New York City, J.W. Goddard, F. Norton Goddard dedicated his adult life to fighting vice and corruption. Though he and his brother Warren Goddard continued to operate J.W. Goddard & Sons (a leading purveyor of tailors' trimmings), Goddard's most notable accomplishment was rooting out the policy racket (an early form of the numbers game

Numbers game

Numbers game, also known as a numbers racket, policy racket or Italian lottery, is an illegal lottery played mostly in poor neighborhoods in the United States, wherein a bettor attempts to pick three digits to match those that will be randomly drawn the following day...

) in New York City. Near the time of his early death, Goddard had succeeded in shaming the Western Union

Western Union

The Western Union Company is a financial services and communications company based in the United States. Its North American headquarters is in Englewood, Colorado. Up until 2006, Western Union was the best-known U.S...

 company out of its active cooperation with wire houses that allowed illegal off-track betting

Off-track betting

Off-track betting refers to sanctioned gambling on horse racing outside a race track.-US history:...

. Today's OTB parlors are the legalized progeny of the former wire houses, immortalized in the movie "The Sting

The Sting

The Sting is a 1973 American caper film set in September 1936 that involves a complicated plot by two professional grifters to con a mob boss . The film was directed by George Roy Hill, who previously directed Newman and Redford in the western Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.Created by...

."