Walter Peterson '47, New Hampshire governor from 1969 to 1973, died of lung cancer at Monadnock Community Hospital in Peterborough, N.H., on June 1, according to his wife, Dorothy Peterson. Walter Peterson, who was treated at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, was 88 years old.
Peterson's tenure as governor was known for a budget surplus, largely attributable to a business profits tax and increased revenues from liquor sales, according to the New Hampshire Division of Historical Resources.
Peterson was instrumental in establishing a 300-person Citizens Task Force that worked to pare down inefficiencies in the state government, according to the website.
Major Wheelock, Peterson's executive assistant and friend of 40 years, said Peterson was a progressive Republican who was willing to work with Democrats to achieve results.
"He was the last of his breed," Wheelock said.
While governor, Peterson also successfully convinced the New Hampshire state university system to accept transfer credits from the community college system, Dorothy Peterson said.
Peterson failed to win re-election in 1973 after he renounced a pledge to veto any proposed income or sales tax, the Associated Press reported. The action was a deviation from the traditional New Hampshire political opposition to income and sales taxes, according to the AP.
Prior to his election as governor, Peterson served in the New Hampshire House of Representatives, where he was elected to his first term in 1961. Peterson rose to majority leader after one term in office, serving as speaker of the House from 1965 to 1969, according to the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript.
In 2004, Peterson joined a group of moderate Republicans who purchased newspaper advertisements before the Republican National Convention urging former President George W. Bush and the Republican party to "come back to the mainstream," the AP reported. The advertisements asked the Republican party to end efforts to weaken environmental law and obstruct embryonic stem cell research, and suggested the appointment of federal judges whose political leanings were more mainstream.
Even after graduating from Dartmouth, Peterson remained active in campus affairs. He was called in to mediate the May 6, 1969 sit-in at Parkhurst Hall, which was initiated by students who were protesting the College administration's position on the Reserve Officer Training Corps, according to Dorothy Peterson.
"He sent in lawyers to explain to [the students] that they were illegally occupying Parkhurst," she said. "He talked with the day troopers and the sheriff and told them that there were kids in there just like their kids. He told them to leave their billy clubs behind, that they were certainly big enough to take teenagers out of Parkhurst."
Peterson's help was requested again in 1986, when students destroyed shanties erected on the Green by the student group Dartmouth Community for Divestment. The shanties were built in protest of the College's investments in companies that conducted business in apartheid-era South Africa, The Dartmouth previously reported.
"The president [of the College] could not mediate the thing, because he had made some statements that indicated a personal prejudice, so he asked Walter to come up," Dorothy Peterson said.
Peterson lessened the severity of the suspension of several students responsible for the shanties' destruction, allowing them to return to the College after completing a community service project, Dorothy Peterson said.
Peterson also worked as the president of Franklin Pierce College from 1975 to 1995 and served as the University of New Hampshire's interim president from 1995 to 1996, the Ledger-Transcript reported.
At Franklin Pierce, Peterson worked to increase transparency and improve the relationship between administrators and faculty members, according to Wheelock.
As president, Peterson changed his office to a 12-by-12-foot room on the ground floor that overlooked an area of campus that was frequented by students at all times of day, Wheelock said.
"[Franklin Pierce students] called him Wally," Wheelock said, adding that Peterson attempted to learn the names of all incoming freshmen by their second week on campus.
A native of Nashua, Peterson originally attended UNH but graduated from the College in 1947, according to the Historical Resources website. His education was interrupted by World War II, during which he served for four years as a Naval Reserve officer in the South Pacific. After graduation, Peterson became a partner in his family's real estate firm, The Petersons, Inc., according to the Historical Resources website.
While at the College, Peterson was a member of the men's basketball team. He continued his love of sports after graduating, according to Dorothy Peterson.
"When we were first married, we lived on what he made playing semi-pro basketball," she said.
