Charles Jonas

Charles Jonas (born Karel Jonáš; October 24, 1840 – January 15, 1896) was a Czech American journalist, linguist, and political activist. He was the 16th lieutenant governor of Wisconsin and served in the Wisconsin Legislature, representing Racine County. Later in life, he was an American consul general to Austria-Hungary, and the Russian and German empires.

Although in 1919 the United States Department of State informed the author Thomas Čapek that Jonas died of heart failure, recent scholarship has determined that Jonas shot himself. His former home in Racine, Wisconsin, the Karel Jonas House, is now listed in the National Register of Historic Places. It is located at 1337 North Erie Street.

Background Karel Jonáš was born on 24 October 1840 in Malešov house 32 to Ignác Jonáš and Terezie Rubínová.

He was elected an alderman for the City of Racine, serving from 1876 to 1883, and would serve as president of the Common Council of Racine for 1878–79.

He was elected as a Democratic member of the Wisconsin State Assembly in 1877 to represent the 1st Racine County district (the City of Racine) (incumbent Republican Norton J. Field was not a candidate for re-election), with 1229 votes to 760 for Republican Edward Gillen; he was assigned to the standing committees on the judiciary and on education. He was not a candidate for re-election in 1878, choosing instead to run on the Greenback Party ticket for the Wisconsin Senate's Third District (Racine County), losing to Republican William Everett Chipman by 3206 to 2177 (there was no Democratic candidate in the race, and some candidates that year ran as Democrats and Greenbackers simultaneously). He was succeeded in the Assembly by Field.

He ran again for the Senate in 1882 as a Democrat (to succeed Republican Albert L. Phillips, who was not a candidate for re-election), winning this time with 3213 votes to 2494 for Republican William T. Lewis; and was assigned to the committees on education and on enrolled bills. He did not run for re-election in 1886, and was succeeded by Republican Henry Allen Cooper.

On November 17, 1886, Jonas was appointed U. S. Consul at Prague by President Grover Cleveland, which position he held until July 16, 1889.

In 1890 he was elected 16th Lieutenant Governor of Wisconsin with a plurality of 34,974 in a four-way race, well ahead of his running mate, Milwaukee mayor George Wilbur Peck. He would serve in that office from 1891 until 1894, when he resigned to become the U.S. consul in Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire; in 1896, he was transferred to Crefeld, German Empire, where he died that same year.

Although in 1919 the Department of State informed author Thomas Čapek that Jonas died of heart failure, recent scholarship has determined that Jonas shot himself. After his death, Jonas was buried in Prague's Olšany Cemetery.