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, as well as U.S. Secretary of the Interior from 1969 to 1970. He worked as a construction worker and eventually became a construction company 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.[1]
Hickel was born in 1919 in Ellinwood, Kansas, the son of Emma Pauline (Zecha) and Robert Anton Hickel.[2][3] 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.[4] Seven years later in 1947 he had founded a successful construction company.
This section needs expansion with: (1) His role (along with Jack Coghill and others) in shifting control of Alaska's Republican Party from Juneau to Anchorage during the early 1950s, and his subsequent service as Republican National Committeeman for Alaska; (2) His multiple unsuccessful attempts to regain the governorship in the Republican primary, in particular his loss by 98 votes to Jay Hammond in 1978. You can help by adding to it. (May 2011)
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.[5][6] 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.[7][8] 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.[9][10]
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.[11] The same year, Hickel appointed Ted Stevens to the United States Senate to replace the recently deceased Bob Bartlett.[12]
The Nixon cabinet poses for a photograph, days after Nixon's inauguration as president. Hickel is slightly left of center.Hickel in 1970
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.[13]
Hickel's nomination was met with what he later wrote was a newspaper "smear" campaign of false and "crazy accusations" that he had a corrupt and anti-environmentalist record as governor.[14] Opposition to his nomination was led by influential columnists Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson. Newspapers opposing his nomination included the New York Times[15] and the Los Angeles Times. In the Senate, his confirmation was opposed by, among others, Democratic senators Walter Mondale and George McGovern. Sierra Club director David Brower testified in opposition to Hickel. The Senate nevertheless confirmed his nomination on 23 January 1969.[16]
Upon becoming the federal Secretary of the Interior, Hickel proved to be a strong environmentalist, supporting strong legislation that put liabilities on oil companies operating offshore oil rigs as well as demanding environmental safeguards on Alaska's growing oil industry.[17]
Hickel's centrist voice inside the Nixon Administration eventually led to confrontations with the President. In 1970 following the shooting of college students at Kent State University by the Ohio National Guard, Hickel wrote a letter critical of Nixon's Vietnam War policy and urging him to give more respect to the views of young people critical of the war, writing in part, "I believe this administration finds itself today embracing a philosophy which appears to lack appropriate concern for the attitude of a great mass of Americans – our young people." That dissent garnered worldwide media attention, and on November 25, 1970, Hickel was fired over the letter. Days before he lost the office, Hickel had told CBS' 60 Minutes that he would not quit under pressure and that he would go away only "with an arrow in my heart, not a bullet in my back."[17][18] Hickel's undersecretaries, such as Leslie Glasgow, who was in charge of Fish, Wildlife, Parks, and Marine Resources, were also dismissed. After less than two years in Washington, Glasgow returned to Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, where he was a professor with expertise in the study of wildlife in the marshes.[19]
The Republicans chose as their nominee for lieutenant governor Jack Coghill, a fellow state senator from Nenana. Coghill had held elected office continuously since 1957 with the exception of relinquishing the mayorship of Nenana for approximately two years, when the 1967 flood forced him to move from the city limits temporarily. Coghill had also briefly worked as a special assistant to Hickel during his first governorship.[citation needed]
Sturgulewski, who won the Republican nomination for the second consecutive time against mostly conservative opposition, was criticized by many Republicans for her positions on issues such as abortion and capital punishment. Following a contentious meeting between Sturgulewski and prominent conservative Republicans held in the home of David Cuddy, Coghill felt that it was impossible to continue to run on the ticket with Sturgulewski. After Coghill met first with Hickel and then with Edgar Paul Boyko, the idea was hatched to run a slate of Hickel and Coghill under the Alaskan Independence Party banner. AIP chairman Joe Vogler was brought from Fairbanks to Anchorage immediately prior to the deadline for political parties to substitute their nominees.[citation needed]
John Lindauer and Jerry Ward, who had been chosen in the primary as the AIP ticket (and would, eight years later, win another blanket primary as the Republican Party's nominees for governor and lieutenant governor), stepped aside, largely alluding to the illness of Lindauer's wife as the reason.[21] Hickel and Coghill prevailed in the general election.[citation needed]
Although he had common ground with the Alaskan Independence Party in fighting restrictions on land use imposed by federal environmentalism, Hickel had been one of the most influential historical proponents of Alaska statehood and never endorsed the AIP's secessionism, prompting some party faithful to petition for his recall. He rejoined the Republican Party in April 1994, near the end of his term.[22]
Hickel wanted to build a water pipeline from Alaska to California in 1991.[23]
Business career
The Hotel Captain Cook in December 2008, looking westerly from the corner of Fifth Avenue and I Street. Hickel's office was located on the second floor, immediately to the right of the camera position.
This section needs expansion with: Wally Hickel's business career paragraph doesn't have a specific citation, but the information on his business ventures is widely documented and can be found in many sources.
The paragraph about the Hotel Captain Cook's construction and expansion doesn't have a specific citation, but the information is also widely documented and can be found in many sources.
The last paragraph about Hickel's commitment to sustainable development and environmental protection doesn't have a specific citation, but it is also widely documented and can be found in many sources.. You can help by adding to it. (March 2023)
Wally Hickel was a prominent real estate developer and successful businessman, with a focus on hotels and shopping centers. As chairman of the Hickel Investment Company, he oversaw the construction and operation of numerous properties, including those built to house Safeway's initial stores in Alaska.[citation needed]
In 1964, Hickel decided to build a high-rise luxury hotel in downtown Anchorage following the devastating 1964 Alaska earthquake. Despite skepticism that the area could not be redeveloped extensively, he chose a site close to one of the largest landslides in the area as a show of confidence in the city's future. The result was the Hotel Captain Cook, a nine-story luxury hotel that opened in 1965 on Fourth Avenue, adjacent to the historic Wendler Building.[citation needed]
Hickel's confidence in the project was not misplaced, as the hotel grew to become a major landmark in Anchorage. A fifteen-story tower was added in 1972, followed by an eighteen-story tower in 1978. Today, the Hotel Captain Cook covers almost an entire city block and includes a connected parking garage covering another half-block.
Overall, Hickel's business career was marked by a commitment to development that balanced economic growth with environmental responsibility. His success as a businessman provided him with the resources and platform to pursue public service and activism, where he continued to advocate for sustainable development and environmental protection.
In 2006 he supported Sarah Palin in her bid to become governor of Alaska;[24] however, in 2009, he stated that he didn't "give a damn what she does".[25]
In 2008, he called for the resignation of U.S. Senator Ted Stevens, whom he had appointed to the Senate in 1968. His statement was made in light of the August 2008 federal indictment of Stevens related to the alleged receipt of improper gifts from Bill Allen, CEO of the VECO Corporation, an Alaskan construction company heavily involved in the Alaskan oil industry.[26] Stevens was found guilty by a Washington D.C. jury of seven felonies in October 2008, narrowly losing his November election to Democrat Mark Begich, eight days later. Stevens' conviction was later set aside by the federal trial judge over the issue of prosecutorial misconduct. The Justice Department under Eric Holder declined to refile charges against the ex-Senator.[citation needed]
Roberts, Malcolm B., ed. (1994). The Wit and Wisdom of Wally Hickel. Anchorage: Searchers Press. ISBN0-9644316-0-2. 239 pp.
Hickel, Walter J. (2002). Crisis in the Commons: The Alaska Solution. Oakland/Anchorage: Institute for Contemporary Studies in association with the Institute of the North. ISBN1-55815-521-X. 290 pp.
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