Francis W. Sargent

Francis William Sargent (July 29, 1915 - October 21, 1998) was governor of Massachusetts from 1969 to 1975. Born in 1915 in Hamilton, Massachusetts, he was known for his sharp wit and self-deprecating manner. A patrician Republican politician, "Sarge" was a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where he was a classmate and friend of I.M. Pei, although Sargent never graduated. [1]. He was a dedicated conservationist who delivered the keynote address at MIT on the first Earth Day in 1970. He had earlier served as state commissioner of natural resources for 10 years, and went on to win appointment as state Commissioner of Public Works in 1964. He was elected Lieutenant Governor in 1966, and in 1969, he became acting governor when Republican John Volpe became secretary of Transportation under President Nixon.^[1] In 1970, Gov. Sargent won election in his own right, defeating Boston mayor Kevin White. He achieved nortoriety by canceling all highway construction inside Route 128 except the Northeast Expressway in 1972. He was governor of the Commonwealth during the strife following Judge Arthur Garrity's 1974 decision to desegregate Boston public schools through court-mandated redistricting of the Boston school system, including busing some students out of their neighborhoods to end a pattern of racial segregation in the schools. Sargent had previously vetoed attempts to repeal or water-down the state's Racial Imbalance Act, which prohibited state aide to racially imbalanced school districts. When Sargent called for obeying the federal court order, pro-segregarion forces complained that he and his neighbors in the well-to-do suburban Boston town of Dover, Massachusetts did not have to share any of the burden of desegregating Boston schools. On occasion, groups of anti-busing protesters from the city showed up to picket his Dover home, only to find that his road had no street lights. He retired from politics after his defeat for reelection by Michael Dukakis in November 1974. He died in 1998 in Dover, Massachusetts^[2], and is buried at the Highland Cemetery in Dover, Massachusetts.

References

External links

• Official Commonwealth of Massachusetts Governor Biography