Louis Murphy

Richard Louis Murphy (November 6, 1875 – July 16, 1936) was a Democratic U.S. senator from Iowa. Elected with President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932, as only the second Democratic senator from Iowa elected since 1852, Murphy's service was cut short by his accidental death in 1936, with over two years remaining in his only term.

Louis Murphy was born to John and Anna Murphy in Dubuque, Iowa, on November 6, 1875. His father was the publisher of the Dubuque Telegraph-Herald. He began a career in journalism at age 15, by serving as a reporter for the Galena, Illinois, Gazette from 1890 to 1892. A chief plank of Murphy's platform was the restoration, as an agricultural relief measure, of the legality of beer. Murphy's wife, one of three passengers injured in the crash, reported that the accident occurred when a tire blew out while Murphy was driving at low speed, causing it to plunge off an embankment. and opposing, until late 1941, Roosevelt's support for Great Britain.

At the time of the accident, Mr. and Mrs. Murphy were the parents of five children—Mary, Elinor Ann, Imelda, Ellen and Charles. A sixth child had died in infancy.