1. Olga Katherine Torkelsen Hurley was the secretary to Alaska Territorial Governor Ernest Gruening from 1944 until his departure from office in 1953.
15 Facts About Katie Hurley
1. 2.
Katie Hurley was Chief Clerk to the Alaska Constitutional Convention from 1955 to 1956 and the secretary to the State Senate for five terms.
3.
Katie Hurley was married in 1944 and then became the executive secretary to the governor that year, even working while she was pregnant, until Gruening's departure from his post in 1953.
4.
Katie Hurley served as the president of the State Board of Education for seven years and was the executive director of the Alaska Women's Commission for three years.
5.
Katie Hurley was the president of the National Federation of Federal Employees.
6.
Katie Hurley won the Democratic primary for Lieutenant Governor in 1978, the first woman ever to win a statewide election in Alaska, joining the ticket of Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Anchorage attorney Chancy Croft.
7.
Katie Hurley was elected to the Matanuska Electric Association board.
8.
Katie Hurley was the Chair of the Alaska Commission for Human Rights, the state Personnel Board and, for nine years, the Matanuska Telephone Association's board of directors.
9.
Katie Hurley lost her state house seat to Republican Curtis Menard in 1986.
10.
Katie Hurley was the executive director of the Alaska Commission on the Status of Women and the President of the State Board of Education for seven years.
11.
Katie Hurley was inducted into the Alaska Women's Hall of Fame in 2009.
12.
Katie Hurley was married to Joe Alexander in 1944; they had two children, David and Susan.
13.
Katie Hurley was the organist for St David's Episcopal Church in Wasilla for decades.
14.
Katie Hurley died near family in a private memory care facility in Portland, Oregon where she lived the final years of her life.
15.
Katie Hurley's passage left delegate and former Alaska state senator Vic Fischer as the only living participant in the state's Constitutional Convention.