Stewart Udall has died at age 90.
I’ve posted the following before, but it seems a fitting tribute to a man who led an active life.
Just this last year [Stewart Udall] rafted down the Colorado River from Lees Ferry — named for Udall’s grandfather — and, with a grandson, trekked from the floor of the Grand Canyon up Bright Angel Trail some 7,000 feet to the South Rim. His family had cautioned against it, and he rejected a Park Service offer of a mule. “They wouldn’t have liked it if I hadn’t made it,” he recounted, “but what a way to go.” Once at the South Rim, Udall marched straight to the bar at the Tovar Lodge and ordered a martini.
Udall was 84 when the above took place.
Stewart Udall was U.S. Secretary of the Interior under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. During his eight years at Interior he made lasting and important contributions to the environment and the American landscape.
He was the father of New Mexico’s U.S. Senator Tom Udall and uncle to Colorado’s U.S. Senator Mark Udall.
Excerpt from a 2005 Los Angeles Times profile of Udall.