The Feuder

Chick-fil-A by Webel on Flickr

Menino vs. Chiofaro

Most of Boston’s successful developers tended to stay on the good side of a mayor with seemingly endless power to approve or crush their projects. Not Don Chiofaro, who engaged in a vicious, and public, battle of words with Menino when the mayor wouldn’t approve his plans to convert a waterfront garage into a pair of skyscrapers. The feud was so legendary, Menino himself referenced it in a satirical video for MassINC in which he acted like Vito Corleone from The Godfather.

Menino vs. McCourt

Frank McCourt had big plans for the 24 acres he owned on the Seaport frontier in the 1990s. Prophetically, he envisioned luxury hotels and condominium towers. But he and Menino didn’t get along. McCourt criticized Menino for being uncooperative, while Menino’s people referred to McCourt as a “parking attendant.” McCourt used the property as collateral for his 2004 purchase of the Los Angeles Dodgers, an organization that entered bankruptcy in 2011.

Menino vs. Chick-fil-A

When the mayor learned that Chick-fil-A was considering opening a location in Boston, he wrote an open letter announcing that the fast-food chain was not welcome because of its opposition to same-sex marriage and LGBT rights. After the letter went viral, Menino was asked whether he actually had the power to keep the chain out of the city. Technically, he didn’t. But have you seen any Chick-fil-A outposts in Boston lately?

For more of our look back at Mayor Menino’s time in office, check out “A Mayor in Full.”