March of the Governors, Governor #23: Hjalmar Petersen
Release Date: 02/06/2023
March of the Governors, Governor #35: Albert Harold Quie
Ramsey County History podcast
Albert H. Quie (1923-2023) left a safe seat in Congress after twenty years to run for governor in 1978. In that, his timing was good. He rode around the “Minnesota Massacre” and into office as the state’s thirty-fifth governor along with fellow Republicans Dave Durenberger and Rudy Boschwitz, who were elected to the US Senate. But in another respect, his timing could not have been worse. A successful first year of tax cuts was followed by an unwelcome recession that slashed state revenues and triggered a three-year budget crisis requiring six special legislative sessions and making most...
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March of the Governors, Governor #34: Rudy Perpich
Ramsey County History podcast
March of the Governors, Governor #34 Rudy Perpich Series Podcast #37 Rudy Perpich (1928-1995) served as Minnesota's thirty-fourth governor in the years 1977 and 1978. He got there by succession when Wendell Anderson resigned. Perpich then appointed Anderson to the US Senate—the first event leading to the Minnesota Massacre of 1978. Perpich was the first Iron Ranger, the first dentist, and first Roman Catholic to serve as governor and, maybe, the last to have grown up in poverty. His term was marked by the national energy crisis, controversies over electric power lines, and...
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March of the Governors, Governor #33: Wendell Anderson
Ramsey County History podcast
March of the Governors, Governor #33 Wendell Anderson (Series Podcast #35) Before an ignominious electoral end, Wendell “Wendy” Anderson was one of Minnesota’s most significant and popular governors. Born and raised on St. Paul’s East Side, he had been an Olympic hockey player and a twelve-year legislative veteran when elected governor in 1970 at the age of thirty-seven. In his first term, Anderson successfully encouraged legislative passage of landmark open government, environmental, labor and other forward-looking laws. Most importantly, he campaigned and got passed a sweeping...
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March of the Governors, Governor #32: Harold Levander
Ramsey County History podcast
March of the Governors, Governor #32 Harold Levander (Series Podcast #35) Harold Levander (1910-1982) ran for political office once in his long life, in 1966. He defeated incumbent governor Karl Rolvaag, served four years, and never ran for office again. He had been a star athlete in college, in football and track, and a national champion orator. He practiced law in Harold Stassen's firm, where he represented rural electric power cooperatives and the South St. Paul stockyards. As a Republican governor, he helped enact a remarkably progressive agenda that included creation of...
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March of the Governors, Governor #31: Karl Fritjof Rolvaag
Ramsey County History podcast
March of the Governors, Governor #31 Karl Fritjof Rolvaag (Series Podcast #34) Karl Fritjof Rolvaag (1913-1990) grew up in Northfield, the son of acclaimed novelist Ole Rolvaag. Upon his father’s untimely death in 1931, Rolvaag roamed the West for five years, working in the fields and forests and allying himself with that most radical of unions—Industrial Workers of the World. He graduated from St. Olaf College in 1942. He then began six years in the US Army that included combat service as a tank commander. After graduate work at the University of Minnesota, he became an organizer and...
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March of the Governors, Governor #30: Elmer L. Andersen
Ramsey County History podcast
March of the Governors, Governor #30 Elmer L. Andersen (Series Podcast #33) For Elmer L. Andersen, his single term as governor (1961-1963) marked a brief episode in a life of remarkable accomplishment. From modest beginnings in Muskegon, Michigan, Andersen rose from salesman for HB Fuller Co. to the leader who made the company a giant. He served with distinction in the state legislature, then defeated the popular and effective governor Orville Freeman in 1960. His great accomplishment as governor was reform of taconite taxation. He was a Republican far to the left of his party. In 1962, he...
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March of the Governors, Governor #29: Orville Lothrop Freeman
Ramsey County History podcast
March of the Governors, Governor #29 Orville Lothrop Freeman (Series Podcast #32) Orville Lothrop Freeman (1918-2003) was, like governors Floyd Olson and Luther Youngdahl before him, a product of the streets and schools of Minneapolis: His parents ran a clothing store on Lake Street. He attended the University of Minnesota, where he played football under the legendary Bernie Bierman, served as student council president, and was a champion debater. College was interrupted by World War II; he enlisted in the US Marines, where his one week in combat at Guadalcanal ended in a firefight and...
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March of the Governors, Governor #28: C. Elmer Anderson
Ramsey County History podcast
March of the Governors, Governor #28 C. Elmer Anderson (Series Podcast #31) Minnesota's twenty-eighth governor, C. Elmer Anderson (1912-1998), mostly aspired to be lieutenant governor, and at that he succeeded—elected six times in seven tries. He rose to governor in September 1951 with the resignation of Luther Youngdahl. Anderson won the governorship on his own in 1952, riding the ample coattails of Dwight Eisenhower. In this role, he tried to carry out Youngdahl's progressive policies, but the stars and the Minnesota senate were against him. He had beaten DFL candidate Orville Freeman...
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March of the Governors Special Edition: Billy Williams
Ramsey County History podcast
March of the Governors Special Edition: Billy Williams March of the Governors Series Podcast #30 William F. (Billy) Williams never served as Minnesota's governor, but he served more Minnesota governors than any public servant in our state's history. He caught the eye of Governor John A. Johnson as a baseball player at the turn of the twentieth century. Johnson invited him to work at the capitol as his aide and messenger. Johnson died, but Williams stayed on, through the next thirteen governors—Eberhart, Hammond, Burnquist, Preus, Christianson, Olson, Petersen, Benson, Stassen, Thye,...
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March of the Governors, Governor #27: Luther Youngdahl
Ramsey County History podcast
March of the Governors, Governor #27 Luther Youngdahl (Series Podcast #29) From his youth, Luther Youngdahl (b. 1896) aspired to be a judge, and he succeeded: Minneapolis Municipal Court (1930-1936), Hennepin County District Court (1936-1942), Minnesota Supreme Court (1942-1946), and US District Court for the District of Columbia (1951-1978.) Along the way, he found time to serve as Minnesota’s twenty-seventh governor (1947-1951.) A deeply committed Christian, Youngdahl found his signature issue in pushing for reforms of the state’s mental hospitals. Elected three times, the Republican...
info_outlineMarch of the Governors, Governor #23: Hjalmar Petersen
(Series Podcast #24)
Hjalmar Petersen (1890-1968) holds many distinctions as a governor of Minnesota: our only Dane, our only Hjalmar, our last immigrant (so far), our only governor from Askov (so far), and the one who served the shortest term (four months.) He served two terms in the legislature, one term as lieutenant governor, and eighteen years as a warehouse and railroad commissioner. He ran for governor four more times—three with the Farmer-Labor Party, one as a Republican. His political career began in 1930 and ended in 1967. He became governor in August 1936 upon the death of Floyd B. Olson. Passed over as Farmer-Labor candidate for governor in the primaries later that year, Petersen nurtured a grudge against the party for years to come. In 1938, he nearly upset Governor Elmer Benson in a primary. He tried again in 1942 and 1946. In 1956, he managed Estes Kefauver’s Minnesota presidential primary win over Adlai Stevenson. He served once more on the railroad and warehouse commission from 1955 to 1967.