Bertram L. Baker

He settled in Brooklyn, N.Y., obtained a degree in accounting from La Salle Extension University correspondence school in Chicago, and became a U.S. citizen in 1924.

[1][4][5] In 1939, Baker was appointed to a patronage job as United States Deputy Collector of Internal Revenue in the income tax division in Brooklyn.

They promised the local incumbent assemblyman, John J. Walsh, another Irish-American, that if he ran for the party's re-nomination in the primary but then withdrew, they would nominate him for a judgeship instead.

[1][8] (As the result of his election, Baker also became the second person to serve in the New York State Assembly who was born in Nevis, after Alexander Hamilton – something that he was fond of telling.)

[2][3] During his tenure in the assembly, Baker sponsored bills prohibiting various types of discrimination, most notably New York's fair housing law.

The Metcalf-Baker Act, which was sponsored in the State Senate by George R. Metcalf, an upstate Republican, was one of the first laws anywhere that outlawed discrimination in housing.

He was survived by his wife Irene, his two daughters Marian Baker-Howell of Brooklyn and Lillian Bemus of Queens, four grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren.