Ralph Luther Criswell (October 12, 1861 – November 17, 1947) was a member of the Los Angeles City Council for ten years in the early 20th century. He then became a special agent, or lobbyist, for the Colorado River Project that brought water to Southern California. Biography Criswell was born on October 12, 1861 in Rushville, Illinois to Edmund L. Criswell and the former Susan Catherine Wright. When he was fourteen, he worked in a print shop and became a Linotype machine operator. He joined the International Typographical Union in 1895 and managed the Johnstown News in Johnstown, Nebraska, and founded the Northwestern County Gazette in 1886 in Kansas. Criswell was married in December 1885 in Tecumseh, Nebraska, to May Greene of Petersburg, Illinois, and after they moved to California in 1897 they lived in Santa Paula for a year, then settled at 529 West 41st Place, Los Angeles. He was employed by the Los Angeles Herald and then the Los Angeles Examiner in 1903, when it was founded. He was a City Council member from 1917 to 1927 and then was hired by the Water and Power commissioners as a "special Colorado River agent." He was a Methodist. Criswell died in his home at 4728 Whitewood Avenue, Lakewood Village, Long Beach on November 17, 1947, and was buried in Inglewood Park Cemetery. He was survived by a son, Ralph Greene Criswell. Public life Elections 1915–17 Criswell was the Socialist Party candidate for mayor in 1915 and came in fourth among six candidates in the primary election and so did not advance to the final. Two years later, in advance of a new campaign for City Council, he resigned from what was called the "red card" wing of the Socialist Party, writing in a letter to E.L. Osgood, chapter secretary: The Socialist movement has far outgrown the present party machinery, and I have decided to cast my lot with that large and constantly growing body of Socialists who believes that the red card organization has outlived its usefulness and that Socialism can no be better advanced through an organization formed as an ordinary political party . . . . 1917–23 At that time he was a member of the city's Civil Service Board, from which he resigned when he was elected councilman in 1917. In the May primary that year, he came in 10th, and in the June general election