Stewart Udall
Stewart Lee Udall (January 31, 1920 – March 20, 2010)[1][2] was an American politician and later, a federal government official who belonged to the Democratic Party. After serving three terms as a congressman from Arizona, he served as Secretary of the Interior from 1961 to 1969, under presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson.[3] A staunch liberal, he is best known for enthusiastically promoting environmentalism while in the cabinet, with success primarily under President Johnson.
Stewart Udall
March 20, 2010 (aged 90)
Santa Fe, New Mexico, U.S.
6, including Tom
Early life and education[edit]
Stewart Udall was born on January 31, 1920, in Saint Johns, Arizona, to Louisa Lee Udall (1893–1974) and Levi Stewart Udall (1891–1960). He had five siblings: Inez, Elma, Morris (Mo), Eloise, and David Burr. As a young boy Stewart worked on the family farm in St. Johns. He was remembered by his mother as a child with tremendous energy and an unquenchable curiosity.[4]
Udall attended the University of Arizona for two years until World War II. He served four years in the Air Force as an enlisted gunner on a B-24 Liberator, flying fifty missions over Western Europe from Italy with the 736th Bomb Squadron, 454th Bomb Group, for which he received the Air Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters. He returned to the University of Arizona in 1946, where he attended law school and played guard on a championship basketball team. In 1947, Udall, along with his brother Mo, helped integrate the University of Arizona cafeteria. Mo and Stewart were respected student athletes and Mo was student body president. On their way to lunch at the Student Union one day, they saw a group of black students eating lunch outside the building. Black students were allowed to buy food in the cafeteria but had to eat outside. When Mo and Stewart invited Morgan Maxwell Jr., a black freshman, to share their table in the cafeteria, it helped to calm some long-simmering issues surrounding racial segregation at the university.[5]