John R. Murdock

John Robert Murdock (April 20, 1885 - February 14, 1972) was a U.S. Representative from Arizona.

Born in Homestead near Lewistown, Missouri, Murdock attended the public schools.He graduated from State Teachers' College, Kirksville, Missouri, in 1912 and received a bachelors degree at the University of Iowa in 1925. He attended graduate school at the University of Arizona and at the University of California at Berkeley.

He was an elementary school teacher and principal in Missouri before he went to the University of Iowa. He was an instructor in the Normal School at Tempe, Arizona(predecessor of Arizona State University. He was then Dean of this institution from 1933-1937. He wrote several textbooks on history and government.

Murdock was elected as a Democrat to the Seventy-fifth and to the seven succeeding Congresses (January 3, 1937-January 3, 1953).He served as chairman of the Committee on Memorials (Seventy-eighth Congress), Committee on Irrigation and Reclamation (Seventy-ninth Congress), Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs (Eighty-second Congress).He was an unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1952 to the Eighty-third Congress.He retired and resided in Scottsdale, Arizona.He died in Phoenix, Arizona, February 14, 1972.He was interred in Double Butte Cemetery, Tempe, Arizona.

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