Katzmann was then in his late forties, a plump, ambitious man whose presence seemed underlined by the smartness of his dress, his snap-brim hat, and his raglan Burberry coat. He had grown up on one of the poorer streets of Hyde Park, a gray semi-industrial adjunct of Boston, attending the Boston Latin School and then crossing the Charles River to enter Harvard with the class of 1896. As an unathletic poor boy from Hyde Park, his years at Harvard were obscure. He belonged to no clubs, took part in no sports or undergraduate activities. Nor, on the other hand, was he a scholar. At the end of his senior year his one distinction was an honorable mention in engineering. Returning to Hyde Park with his diploma, he worked for several years as a meter-reader for the local electric-light company. What he really wanted was to be a lawyer. If he had had the money he would have gone on to the Harvard Law School. Instead he attended night sessions at Boston University, receiving his bachelor of laws degree in 1902. For the next year he served as an apprentice with one of the established firms of Boston’s Pemberton Square. But the staid legal world of Beacon Hill and State Street was a fenced-off Brahmin preserve. A Hyde Park boy with a B.U. law degree and a dubious name would not penetrate that circle. Katzmann was sensitive about his name. His mother’s maiden name—his own middle one—was Gunn, and he tried to emphasize its Anglican propriety in his signature. After his year at Pemberton Square he returned to the familiar puddle of Hyde Park and set up his office on the second floor of a wooden building on River Street. There, in a small ocher room with a creaking floor smelling of oil, he hung his two diplomas and filled several sectional bookcases with secondhand volumes of _Corpus Juris_. He prospered. From 1907 to 1908 he represented Hyde Park in the Massachusetts legislature. The following year he was appointed assistant district attorney. From 1909 until Hyde Park was absorbed by Boston in 1912 he served on the school committee. In November, 1916, he ran for district attorney and was elected to a three-year term. In 1919 he was re-elected.