Duluth's longest-serving mayor, Samuel Frisby Snively, was born on November 24, 1859 in Cumberland, Pennsylvania. After earning a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania, he and a friend opened a law firm in Duluth in 1886. They did very well until the financial ruin of 1893, after which Snively tried his luck in the Yukon gold rush of 1897. He was unsuccessful, but he returned to Duluth and found prosperity in farmland development. After building a creek parkway (Seven Bridges Road) and several others, Snively was elected mayor in 1921 at the age of 61. He held the office for sixteen years, leaving a legacy of beautiful parkland and boulevards. He continued this work after his four terms until he died a bachelor on November 7, 1952 in Duluth.
Charles Hinman Graves was a colonel in the army before his term as mayor in 1882-1883. He went on to serve in the Minnesota Legislature before his death in 1928. Marcus B. Cullum, born in 1856, served as Duluth's mayor from 1904-1907 and again from 1910-1911. He began work on what is now Leif Erikson Park, and was later a strong figure in the Minnesota Legislature before he died in 1932. Clinton Markell was Duluth's second mayor, elected in 1870. After his tenure he continued in the grain and mining businesses until his death in 1912.