Everything about Leverett Saltonstall totally explained
» For his great-grandfather, see Leverett Saltonstall I.
Leverett A. Saltonstall (
September 1,
1892–
June 17,
1979) was an
American Republican politician who served as Governor of
Massachusetts (1939–1945) and as a
United States Senator (1945–1967).
Saltonstall was born in
Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts and was a longtime summer resident of
Vinalhaven, Maine. As an adult he spent winters on his family estate in
Dover, Massachusetts, where he liked to farm. His father was Richard Middlecott Saltonstall, a lawyer; his mother, Eleanor Brooks Saltonstall, was the daughter of a multimillionaire, Peter C. Brooks. He married Alice Wesselhoeft (1893-1981) in 1916 had they'd six children, including Emily (1920-2006), at one time the daughter-in-law of
Richard Byrd and a former
WAVE; Peter Brooks Saltonstall,
killed in action on Guam on August 13, 1944; William Leverett Saltonstall (b. 1927), a former member of the
Massachusetts Senate; and Susan (1930-1994), a horse breeder.
Part of the
Boston Brahmin Saltonstall family, he was able to trace his ancestral roots to the
Mayflower, the
Pilgrims and the
Massachusetts Bay Colony, Saltonstall was the tenth generation in direct descent to graduate from Harvard and the great-grandson of a
U.S. Congressman of the same name.
A graduate of the private
Noble and Greenough School, he graduated from
Harvard College in 1914, where he was captain of the Junior Varsity crew that won the prestigious Grand Challenge Cup at the Henley Royal Regatta – the first American crew ever to do so – and
Harvard Law School in 1917. Prior to being admitted to the bar, he served as a first lieutenant in the
United States Army during and after
World War I from 1917 to 1919.
Saltonstall, a Republican, entered politics as an
alderman in
Newton, Massachusetts from 1920 to 1922, while simultaneously serving as an assistant district attorney of
Middlesex County from 1921 to 1922. He was elected to the
Massachusetts House of Representatives that same year; there he rose to the position of
Speaker of the House, which he held from 1929 to 1937. In 1936, he was defeated for
Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts, but made a political comeback two years later when he was elected
Governor of Massachusetts, a position he held for three terms from 1939 to 1945.
During that period, Governor Saltonstall mediated a
Teamsters
strike, reduced taxes, and retired 90 percent of the state's debt. He served as President of the National Governor's Association from 1943 to 1944.
In 1944, he was elected to the
United States Senate in a special election to fill the unexpired term created by the resignation of U.S. Senator
Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. He was re-elected three times to the U.S. Senate, serving from 1945 to 1967. Those he defeated included John Corcoran in 1944, John I. Fitzgerald in 1948, and
Foster Furcolo in 1954 and Thomas J. O'Connor, Jr. in 1960. During his tenure in the Senate, he served as the Senate Republican Whip and on five influential Senate committees. He also served as the chair of the
Senate Republican Conference, 1957–1966.
The legendary, but anti-Protestant,
James Michael Curley once described Saltonstall as having a "Harvard accent with a South Boston face." Though the remark was intended as a political jab, it resonated with truth, as Saltonstall had an uncanny ability to blend his aristocratic lineage with a personable charm which greatly appealed to the average worker and the common man.
Leverett Saltonstall died of
congestive heart failure in 1979 aged 86, and is buried in Harmony Grove Cemetery in
Salem, Massachusetts. The
Saltonstall Building in downtown
Boston is named for him.
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