Walter Joseph Hickel (18 August 1919-7 May 2010) was the Republican Governor of Alaska from 5 December 1966 to 29 January 1969 (succeeding William A. Egan and preceding Keith Harvey Miller) and from 3 December 1990 to 5 December 1994 (succeeding Steve Cowper and preceding Tony Knowles), and United States Secretary of the Interior from 24 January 1969 to 25 November 1970 (succeeding Stewart Udall and preceding Rogers Morton).
Biography[]
Walter Joseph Hickel was born in Ellinwood, Kansas in 1919, and he was raised on a tenant farm in Claflin during the Great Depression. He moved to Alaska in 1940 and founded a successful construction company in 1947, and he supported Alaskan statehood while serving as finance chairman of the Alaska Republican Party during the 1950s. He first served as Governor from 1966 to 1969 after defeating the incumbent Democratic governor William A. Egan, discovering oilfields at Prudhoe Bay, but opposing extreme exploitation due to his environmentalist views. He also sought to improve the state's relations with Alaska Natives by supporting their land claims. He went on to serve as President Richard Nixon's Secretary of the Interior from 1969 to 1970, and he was fired for criticizing the administration's lack of concern for young people in the wake of the Kent State shootings. He returned to politics in 1990 as the Alaska Independence Party's candidate for Governor, winning the election; he had little in common with the AIP apart from fighting governmental restrictions on land use, and he returned to the Republican Party in April 1994. He supported Sarah Palin's 2006 gubernatorial bid, and he died in 2010.