Bob Kemp came from an old, illustrious Troy family. An ancestor had founded the Burden Iron Works in the 1800s when Troy was in its industrial heyday. I believe that it was the major supplier of horseshoes to the Union Army during the war between the states, as well as a supplier of rails when the west was opened. See http://www.angelfire.com/journal/millbuilder/album3.html Bob's grandfather had been Troy's mayor and president of a bank in the 1870s.
Bob told me that his brother was then the president of Sun Oil Company, and he provided Bob with a stipend. As a young man, Kemp was apparently quite brilliant. He was admitted to practice before the Patent Office, although he was not a lawyer. One day he showed me a current copy of the Aviation News, which stated in an article that some material or process that he had patented in 1923 was just then (in 1963) being implemented into aircraft usage. (See U.S. Patent #1469220 granted to Robert Kemp)
Robert’s troubles reportedly started during the early 1930s. Although he was unpopular as an atheist in a very Catholic city, he became hated as an avowed communist, going so far as to publish small books (one of which he showed me) in which he listed himself as “Robert Kemp, Chief Engineer to Josef Stalin, Troy, CCCP”. (Copies are available at the Troy Public Library and the Library of Congress*) He was openly jeered, and his home at 552 Fourth Avenue in the old Lansingburg section of Troy was frequently damaged by young vandals. He was known in Lansingburg as “Commie Kemp”, He said that sometime after WWII, he became an anti-communist. In a legal pleading, he described himself as “an inventor, scientist, pioneering engineer, venture capitalist, an anti-communistic businessman, an Atheist, and a Heretic.”
At some time prior to 1963, vandals set fire to his home, causing considerable damage, which he was unable to repair. Eventually, the City of Troy commenced an action against him and obtain an order directing the demolition of his house as being unsafe and a danger to the community. A default judgment was taken, and a judge signed the order permitting the building’s demolition. Shortly before the demolition was to have occurred, Kemp went to Judge Donald Taylor and pleaded for help. The judge issued a stay to permit Kemp to appeal the order to the five-judge Appellate Division. Kemp threw himself into the appeal (which was the stage of the matter when I met him).
Kemp based his appeal on the theory that the City’s action was a Catholic conspiracy to punish him for having been a communist, and pointed out in his 112± page affidavit of service that Mr. Kelleher, the mayor, Mr. LeForestier, the corporation counsel, Mr. Ryan, the building inspector, Mr. Bizzarro, a deputy corporation counsel, and the Pope were all Catholics. The "affidavit of service" of his notice of appeal was much more extensive than his actual appellate brief, which restated many of the same “facts” and arguments. Most interesting to me were exhibits included in the affidavit of service, such as an actual early 1900s letter that he wrote to his female friend while traveling to Germany to study zeppelins and a 1929 article that stated that he was the principal speaker at a physics convocation at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Although Kemp came to the law office to photocopy certain documents, he produced his legal papers with a typewriter, using a mimeograph to reproduce copies. His typing was not very good, and the documents were rampant with xxxx outs and carroted corrections, making the reading quite difficult. (His typing improved somewhat over time as he produced hundreds of pages of pleadings.) Kemp was frugal, and to save money he mimeographed his early pleadings on used paper. One document I saw, an Appellate Division brief, was printed “Central Markets” in green ink on the reverse side.
Although his legal brief did not really address the issue on which Judge Taylor based the stay, the Appellate Division reviewed the record on appeal and reversed the lower court order, remanding it to the lower court for a fact-finding hearing, which had never been held (it had acted solely on affidavits). Corporation Counsel LeForestier was so upset to have been beaten by Kemp, that he simply abandoned the case. Kemp, however, understood the decision to be the appellate court’s acceptance that he was the victim of a Catholic conspiracy. Kemp then launched a series of pro se lawsuits against the City of Troy and LeForestier, both in New York Supreme Court (the lower general jurisdiction court) and in the US District Court, all of which were dismissed. I believe that he died soon after the last dismissal.
I copied this from a Chicago church website regarding Kemp’s grandfather:
“William was a well-known Troy business leader, described in contemporary histories of the city as "among the most intelligent and sagacious of the businessmen of Troy" and "an inspiring example to the youth of our land." A self-made man who had left school at the age of nine, he became president of a brass foundry and a bank, served as mayor of the city from 1873 to 1875, was active in the Republican Party, and served as a trustee of a number of institutions in the city and senior warden of Christ Episcopal Church. Robert Kemp himself was unmarried, and at this time probably in his mid-forties; he was a graduate of Williams College (there is no information on the seminary which he attended) and had served for seventeen years as curate of St. Paul's Church, New York City, until December 1906.”
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