Biography
Walter J. Hickel served as Governor of Alaska 1966-1969, 1990-1994, and also as U.S. Secretary of the Interior, 1969-1970.
Born in Claflin, Kansas in 1919, Hickel came to Alaska in 1940 and worked as a bartender, carpenter, and developer.
During the 1950s he played a major role in the fight to get 103 million acres included in Alaska’s statehood land entitlement, while developing hotels, housing, and shopping centers in Anchorage, Fairbanks, and Seward.
During the 1960s, as the state’s second governor, he pushed to open Prudhoe Bay to oil development. As a businessman, he built the Hotel Captain Cook, which is today one of the largest individually-owned hotels in the world. He was named Alaskan of the year in 1969.
As Secretary of the Interior in President Nixon’s cabinet, and afterwards, as a national figure in the 1970s, he oversaw the basic permitting process for the Trans-Alaska oil pipeline and helped gain the votes in Congress necessary to get the pipeline going. He played a key role in the settlement of Alaska Native Land Claims, and spoke out nationally for the 200-mile limit to protect Alaska’s fisheries. In 1979, Governor Hickel and Alaska’s first Governor, William A. Egan founded Commonwealth North, a public policy forum.
During the 1980s, as a business leader, he founded Yukon Pacific Corporation which gained permission to export Alaska natural gas to Asia, which had to that time been prohibited. He also played a key role in efforts to open the Alaska-Russia border in May 1988. In May, 1988, he received the “Grand Cordon of the Order of the Sacred Treasure” from His Imperial Majesty, the Emperor of Japan for his leadership in building close Japanese-Alaskan ties.
In 1990, he was again elected governor. In his second term he settled the Exxon Valdez lawsuits, and the billion-dollar fund collected was used to buy land and support science in Prince William Sound, Kachemak Bay, and on Kodiak and Afognak Islands. Hickel played a major role in the establishment of the Alaska Sealife Center in Seward. He pushed for establishment of community development quotas, a form of Individual Fishing Quotas that has become a model for fish caught in the North Pacific. He also took the problem of by-catch fish waste to the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio, where he was the only governor asked to speak. As governor, he collected over $4 billion in long overdue taxes and royalties from oil producers on state land, and established the Northern Forum, a circumpolar association of northern regional governors. He continues as Secretary-General of the Northern Forum.
Today, Governor Hickel devotes much of his time to the Institute of the North to help teach people in Alaska and from around the globe about the obligations of ownership, as most of the world’s resources are commonly owned. The institute fosters research and teaching on issues of regional and national strategy on common ownership of lands and oceans, and will eventually attract students from around the U.S. and the world to learn about Alaska, Arctic geography and how to manage the “commons.”
Hickel and his wife, Ermalee, have six sons and 16 grandchildren.
HONORS & AWARDS
“Alaskan of the Year” – 1969
DeSmet Medal – Highest award given by the University of Gonzaga, once a year, to the man who does most to further Catholicism, both in private and public life. May, 1969.
Ripon Society’s “Man of the Year” for 1970. April 20, 1970.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Engineering – Stevens Institute of Technology at Hoboken, New Jersey. June 6, 1970.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Laws – St. Mary of the Plains College, Dodge City, Kansas. May 16, 1970.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Public Administration – Willamette University, Oregon. May 16, 1971.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Laws – Saint Martin’s College, Olympia, Washington. May 14, 1971.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Laws – University of Maryland, Baltimore. June 4, 1971.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Laws – Adelphi University, New York. June 6, 1971.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Laws – University of San Diego. May 27, 1972.
Honorary Degree – Doctor Laws – Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York. May 25, 1973.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Engineering – Michigan Technological University, Houghton, Michigan. June 16, 1973.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Laws – University of Alaska. May 7, 1976.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Laws – Alaska Pacific University. May 11, 1991.
Honorary Degree – Doctor of Laws – Benedictine College, Atchison, Kansas, May 17, 2003.
Horatio Alger Award – May, 1972.
“Boss of the Year” – The National Secretaries Association (International), Juneau, Alaska, 1968; Anchorage, Alaska, 1974.
City of Hope National Medical and Research Center “Spirit of Life” Award. October 21, 1976.
Nominated for President as Favorite Son Candidate from Alaska, at Republican National Convention, 1968.
Elected to the Alaska Press Club Hall of Fame, 1969.
Certificate of Award for “Best Non-Fiction Book” – Alaska Press Club, May 9, 1972 (for WHO OWNS AMERICA?).
“William A. Egan Outstanding Alaskan” Award – Alaska State Chamber of Commerce – 1987.
“1988 Alaska Business Hall of Fame Laureate” – Junior Achievement and Alaska Business Monthly. January 26, 1988.
“Grand Cordon of the Order of the Sacred Treasure” from His Imperial Majesty the Emperor of Japan, May 16, 1988.
Salvation Army “Others” Award, November 18, 1998.
Alaska Public Radio Network’s “Top 40 Most Influential Alaskans.” (Alaska’s 40 most influential persons during its first 40 years as identified by a poll of prominent Alaskan leaders from public, private, non-profit, and corporate sectors.) 1999
Commonwealth North Founder’s Award, August 18, 1999.
Ford’s Theatre Lincoln Medal for spearheading the campaign to save the theatre, March 3, 2002.
“Order of the Smashed Brick,” from the Honorable Roger Simmons, PC, Consul General of Canada, March 9, 2002.
Gene Guess Humanitarian Award (presented at the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce Gold Pan Awards banquet, September 17, 2005)
Gold Palm of Jerusalem, the highest award given in the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre (presented to Walter and Ermalee Hickel, September 16, 2006).
