Walter Joseph Hickel (August 18, 1919 – May 7, 2010) was an American businessman, real estate developer, and politician who served as the second governor of Alaska from 1966 to 1969 and 1990 to 1994 and as U.S. Secretary of the Interior from 1969 to 1970. He worked as a construction worker and eventually became a construction company owner/operator during Alaska's territorial days. Following World War II, Hickel became heavily involved with real estate development, building residential subdivisions, shopping centers and hotels. Hickel entered politics in the 1950s during Alaska's battle for statehood and remained politically active for the rest of his life.
Hickel served as the second governor of Alaska, defeating incumbent and first governor William A. Egan in 1966. He served as governor until 1969, ending with his resignation upon his appointment to the position of United States Secretary of the Interior in the cabinet of President Richard Nixon. Hickel later served a full term as governor from 1990 to 1994 under the banner of the Alaskan Independence Party.
Early life and career
Hickel was born in 1919 in Ellinwood, Kansas, the son of Emma Pauline (Zecha) and Robert Anton Hickel. He grew up on his parents' Dust Bowl tenant farm during the Great Depression near Claflin, Kansas. In October 1940 he moved to Alaska and traveled to it aboard the S.S. Yukon with 95 other passengers and went into the local real estate industry. Seven years later in 1947 he had founded a successful construction company.
Hickel joined Democrats in calling for Alaskan statehood during the late 1940s and into the 1950s. In 1958, the Alaska Statehood Act was signed into law by President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Political career
1950s
By the 1950s, he was the finance chairman of the Republican Party and, in 1952, received the backing of businessmen in Anchorage for the territorial governorship, but Benjamin Heintzleman was appointed instead. In 1953, Hickel along with the national committeewoman for Alaska, the vice chairman for the territorial party and his wife went to the Republican Party's western conference in San Francisco and was later elected as head of the Anchorage Republican Club. In December 1953, he and eighteen other prominent Republicans from Anchorage sent a letter to Governor Heintzleman requesting the resignation of Robert DeArmond and that he be replaced with somebody from Anchorage, and they later telegrammed Secretary of the Intertior Douglas McKay asking him to build up the party and also asked Heintzleman to reconsider his decision to cancel his meeting with them.
First governorship
Hickel was elected as Alaska's second governor in the 1966 state general elections, defeating his Democratic rival and incumbent governor Bill Egan. Hickel's first governorship, the second in the young state's history as well as Alaska's first Republican governorship, oversaw the discovery of oilfields at Prudhoe Bay in 1968, a factor that would prove politically decisive in later years. Hickel, a moderate Republican and environmentalist, did not push for heavy oil exploitation. Nevertheless, during his first few months in office, his administration approved the sale of oil leases on 37,000 acres of the North Slope despite opposition from Alaskan Natives. In November 1968, Hickel's department of transportation began construction on a 400-mile road from Livengood to Prudhoe Bay that would later be known as the Hickel Highway. The same year, Hickel appointed Ted Stevens to the United States Senate to replace the recently deceased Bob Bartlett.
Like his predecessor Egan, Hickel sought to improve relations with Alaskan Natives in seeking resolutions on Native land claims. A group of Native Americans from Interior Alaska, including Morris Thompson and Don and Jules Wright, played major roles in his 1966 campaign and subsequent governorship.
Interior secretary
Richard Nixon's election as U.S. President in late 1968 led to an offer to Hickel from the President-elect to serve in the United States Cabinet as Interior Secretary. Initially, Hickel declined the cabinet offer. Nixon replied that his decision was final. Hickel would recall years later that he cried afterward and announced that he would be resigning from the governorship to go to Washington.