High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Walter Joseph "Wally" Hickel (August 18, 1919 – May 7, 2010) was an industrialist, focused mostly on construction and real estate development, and a politician of the Republican and Alaskan Independence parties from the U.S. state of Alaska. Hickel served as the second and eighth Governor of Alaska. His first term as governor was from 1966 to 1969, and ended with his resignation upon his confirmation in the position of United States Secretary of the Interior in the Cabinet of President Richard Nixon. He later served a complete term as governor from 1990 to 1994.