- Peter Lougheed
Infobox President
name = Edgar Peter Lougheed
PC, CC, AOE, QC, BA, LL.B, MBA, LL.D
small
birth_date = birth date and age |1928|07|26
birth_place = Calgary,Alberta
residence =Calgary
death_date =
death_place =
order = 10thPremier of Alberta
term_start = 10 September 1971
term_end = 1 November 1985
predecessor =Harry E. Strom
successor =Don Getty
office1 = Member of theLegislative Assembly of Alberta for Calgary West
term_start1 = 23 May 1967
term_end1 = 28 February 1986
predecessor1 =Donald S. Fleming
successor1 =Elaine McCoy
party = Progressive Conservative
religion =Anglican
spouse = Jeanne Lougheed (née Rogers)
children = Stephen, Andrea, Pamela, and Joseph
profession=Lawyer
alma_mater=University of Alberta ,Harvard University Edgar Peter Lougheed, PC, CC, AOE, QC, (born
July 26 ,1928 , inCalgary, Alberta ) is a Canadianlawyer , and a formerpolitician andCanadian Football League player. He served as premier ofAlberta from 1971 to 1985.Lougheed is the grandson of Sir
James Alexander Lougheed . In 1950, he received a BA degree, and in 1952, he received a LL.B degree, both from theUniversity of Alberta . While in Edmonton as a student, he played football for theEdmonton Eskimos (for two seasons, 1949 and 1950) and served as President of the Students' Union and of the Alberta Chapter ofDelta Upsilon . In 1954, he received a MBA degree fromHarvard University .In 1965, he was elected leader of the Alberta Progressive Conservatives. The party won the 1971 provincial election, with 49 of the 75 seats in the legislature, defeating the Social Credit Party which had governed the province since the 1935 election. Lougheed established a
Tory dynasty in the province that has continued uninterrupted since then. Lougheed led his party to victory in the 1975, 1979 and 1982 provincial elections.As
Premier , Lougheed furthered the development of the oil and gas resources, and started theAlberta Heritage Fund as a way of ensuring that the exploitation of non-renewable resources would be of long-term benefit to Alberta. He also introduced the Alberta Bill of Rights. Lougheed quarrelled withPierre Trudeau 's federal Liberal government over its 1980 introduction of theNational Energy Program . But Lougheed and Trudeau eventually reached an agreement for energy revenue sharing in 1982, after hard bargaining. The successfulCalgary bid to host the 1988Winter Olympics was developed during Lougheed's terms.From 1996–2002, Lougheed served as Chancellor of
Queen's University .Lougheed currently sits on the boards of a variety of organizations and corporations.
Early life
Peter Lougheed was born in
Calgary on 26 July 1928, the son of Edna and Edgar Lougheed.cite web |url=http://www.assembly.ab.ca/lao/library/premiers/lougheed.htm |title=Peter Lougheed |publisher=Legislative Assembly of Alberta |accessdate=2008-09-18] His paternal grandfather was SirJames Lougheed , a successful lawyer, federal cabinet minister, and senator.cite book |last=Tupper |first=Allan |editor=Bradford J. Rennie |title=Alberta Premiers of the Twentieth Century |year=2004 |publisher=Canadian Plains Research Center, University of Regina |location=Regina, Saskatchewan |isbn=0-88977-151-0 |pages=205 |chapter=Peter Lougheed] Sir James accumulated a seizable fortune before his 1925 death, but theGreat Depression wiped out much of it, and the first years of Peter's life was spent moving from one rented accommodation to another. He was educated at the Strathcona School for Boys, Earl Grey School, Rideau Park School, and the Central Collegiate Institute, all in Calgary. At the last of these, he proposed the formation of astudents' union , and subsequently became its first president.cite web |url=http://www.queensu.ca/secretariat/History/people/lougheed.html |title=Peter Lougheed |publisher=Queens University |accessdate=2008-09-19] He also excelled at sports, particularly football.Upon graduating from Central Collegiate, Lougheed enrolled at the
University of Alberta , from which he graduated with aBachelor of Arts (in 1950 or 1951) and abachelor of laws (in 1952). There, he played football for theUniversity of Alberta Golden Bears and, in 1949 and 1950, theEdmonton Eskimos . [cite web |url=http://www.cflapedia.com/Players/l/loughheed_peter.htm |title=Peter Lougheed |publisher=CFLapedia |accessdate=2008-09-19] He also served as president of the Students' Union in 1951–1952 and was editor of the sports section for the Gateway, the University of Alberta student newspaper. [cite web |url=http://www.registrar.ualberta.ca/calendar/General-Information/History-Traditions/241.3.html |title=List of Students' Union presidents |publisher=University of Alberta |work=University of Alberta calendar |accessdate=2008-09-19] While studying at the University of Alberta, he lived for a time inRutherford House as a member of theDelta Upsilon fraternity. [cite web |url=http://www.ualbertacentennial.ca/organization/campus/fraternities/delta_upsilon.html |title=Delta Upsilon |publisher=University of Alberta centennial celebration |accessdate=2008-09-22] In 1952, he married Jeanne Rogers, who he met during his schooling. Soon after the wedding, the couple went toMassachusets , where Lougheed pursued aMaster of Business Administration atHarvard University , which he earned in 1954. During this degree, he worked for a summer withGulf Oil inTulsa ,Oklahoma , where he witnessed an oil boom town after the oil ran out; political scientist Allan Tupper has suggested that Lougheed saw here a possible future of Alberta. [Tupper 205-206]After Harvard, Lougheed had to make decisions about his career. He believed that people should avoid excessive specialization in favour of maximizing their diversity of experience.Tupper 206] He anticipated spending time in business, law, and politics. In pursuit of the first, he took a management position with Mannix Corporation, a Canadian construction firm. Later, he left the company to establish a law practice. During the early sixties, he began to turn his attention towards politics.
Early political career
Lougheed was of Conservative stock, and it was with that party that he decided to pursue his political career. At the time, Alberta was represented almost entirely by Progressive Conservatives in the
Canadian House of Commons . While this might have made federal politics appealing to Lougheed, he viewed it as a drawback; he considered the field of federal P.C. politicians from Alberta to be crowded, and the life of abackbencher held little appeal for him. Instead, he turned his attention to the provincial Progressive Conservatives, who held no seats in theLegislative Assembly of Alberta and who had captured only 13% of the vote in the 1963 election (when it had contested only 33 of the province's 63 constituencies). The province had been governed by the Social Crediters since 1935, with the government having been led for all but the first eight years of that period by PremierErnest Manning . Manning was popular, and had won 60 of 63 seats in the legislature in 1963, but Lougheed felt that the the time was ripe for change. He believed that Albertans were beginning to find Social Credit too rural and insufficiently assertive in intergovernmental relations. In Lougheed's view, Alberta should be a senior partner in Confederation, and Social Credit was out of touch with the province's potential.He resolved to capture the leadership of the provincial Progressive Conservative party and to navigate it into government.Tupper 207] The first phase of this was not difficult; despite having no provincial profile and little organization, Lougheed defeated Duncan McKillop, a former former P.C. candidate (
Calgary Queens Park 1963) and fellow Calgary lawyer, on the first ballot of the party's 1965 convention.cite book |title=Peter Lougheed: A Biography |first=Allan |last=Hustak |publisher=McLelland and Stewart |city=Toronto |year=1979 |pages=68-69] Another candidate, Edson town councillor John Scott, had withdrawn on the convention's first day. Lougheed was nominated from the floor byLou Hyndman and Charles Arthur Clark, father of future Prime MinisterJoe Clark . Vote totals were not released.Lougheed's first challenge as leader was a 1966
by-election inPincher Creek–Crowsnest . The riding had been represented by Social CrediterWilliam Kovach , who had died.cite web |url=http://www.electionsalberta.ab.ca/pastbyelection.html |title=Summary of Results for Past By-Elections |publisher=Elections Alberta |accessdate=2008-09-23]Honours
Lougheed was styled "The Honourable" for the duration of his membership in the
Executive Council of Alberta from 1971 to 1986. When he was appointed a privy councillor (postnominal: "PC") on April 17, 1982, the style "The Honourable" was extended for life. In 1986, he was named a Companion of theOrder of Canada (postnominal: "CC"), and in 1989 he was named to theAlberta Order of Excellence (postnominal: "AOE"). In 2001 he was inducted into theCanadian Medical Hall of Fame .The
Peter Lougheed Provincial Park was named after him in Alberta, and an acute care hospital has been named thePeter Lougheed Centre .Electoral record
As party leader
As MLA
References
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