My last column was wrong: Don't name roads or buildings for Jay Hammond

My column about place names last week produced a lot of interesting reader responses, including a report of a street in North Pole called Loose Moose Loop. One message got me thinking. It said the basic idea behind the column was wrong.

In case you missed it, I said our names do a poor job of remembering our history, as exemplified by the fact that one of our most popular former governors, the late Jay Hammond, is without anything named for him.

[Alaska has 'Grand Larry Street' but nothing named for Jay Hammond]

A reader pointed out that Kwethluk has Jay Hammond Way. Brian Rogers pointed out a bigger problem. Rogers served in the state House of Representatives when Hammond was governor and spent seven years as chancellor of the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and emailed me Sunday.

"The university has on more than one occasion thought of naming facilities for Jay Hammond. We've been told more than once that Jay specifically asked that no buildings be named for him," Rogers wrote in his email. "I agree that it is important to honor those who built this state. But to do so in a way that's contrary to their wishes is to dishonor them."

Rogers didn't know why Hammond resisted having university buildings named for him, so I contacted some of Hammond's friends and his widow, Bella. After talking to them, I realized that Hammond's refusal to be memorialized in concrete said more about him and his service to Alaska than any road sign or engraved sign on front of a building could do.

"That's the way Jay was. He was modest in many ways," Bella said from her home on Lake Clark.

Former Sen. Rick Halford, a family friend, said he tried to persuade Hammond to accept honors.

"He never was interested in that kind of recognition," Halford said. "You first would have to go through the process of convincing him that using his name would accomplish something good."

There's no question about the size of Hammond's legacy, and it is still growing. His most important accomplishment was the Alaska Permanent Fund dividend, which most experts agree is a primary reason the fund survived and grew to enormous size. Without Hammond, Alaska's future after oil would be far darker.

At Hammond's memorial service, in 2005, the late U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens said, "Gov. Hammond impacted more lives than any other Alaskan who has ever lived."

Hammond's autobiography, and the story he often told, was that he never wanted to be governor, or even to be a politician — it's in the title: "Tales of Alaska's Bush Rat Governor: The extraordinary autobiography of Jay Hammond, wilderness guide and reluctant politician." (The length of the title also reflects Hammond's love of using as many words as possible to make his point.)

I was always skeptical that you could spend 12 years in the Legislature and eight as governor if you didn't want to. But Hammond's chief of staff in the second term, Jerry Reinwand, said Hammond truly grieved after he won a bitterly fought and virtually tied re-election in 1978. He felt trapped in Juneau away from his home. Bella had cancer. He discussed the possibility of resigning.

Reinwand said Hammond's long-cherished idea of a dividend got him going again. It passed thanks to his single-minded focus and use of his considerable power. Ultimately, legislators gave in because they were afraid otherwise he would veto their pet projects. For all his reluctance, Hammond was a canny politician who knew how to play his cards.

As the end of the second term approached, Reinwand cornered Hammond to talk about a legacy project.

"He didn't want to talk about it. But at least from my point of view, it was, 'People are going to want to do something,'" Reinwand said. "He didn't get in public service for recognition. He didn't like the limelight. He just wanted to do his job."

Reinwand and Halford said Hammond had a long list of things that he didn't want named after him, including buildings, roads, anything paid for by industry or by government appropriations, or anything already named for someone else.

After Hammond's death, Stevens proposed renaming Lake Clark National Park for him. He withdrew the plan because Bella Hammond was uncomfortable with displacing Clark's name (the park is named for the lake, which is named for James W. Clark, an early trading post operator).

Bella told me she would like to see a wilderness area within the park named for Hammond. Rogers said the university could still name a new inter-disciplinary fisheries program for Hammond, something he once said he would approve.

I thought Hammond's reluctance to lead was a put-on. It's easy enough not to be elected to office; running and serving is hard. But his reluctance to be memorialized convinces me. And it makes me like him even better.

I'm reminded of the story of young King Arthur, as told in T.H White's "The Sword in the Stone," who after accidentally pulling the magic sword Excalibur from a stone was declared king — but cried because he was upset to see his own adoptive father kneel before him. Not wanting to be king qualified him to be king.

Hammond has become an Alaska myth. He is the hero who came in from the Bush to bring common sense to the Capitol and save our oil wealth. Like all symbols, the myth of Hammond is oversimplified and sometimes misused but it's something we need, especially now.

We're in difficult times. Our president-elect seems to love his own name more than the nation he will serve. The Legislature is rapidly spending our savings, courting disaster. Sometimes it seems we've forgotten what a real leader looks like.

But we have an example.

Bella Hammond said: "He loved Alaska very much and cared deeply about what happens to our state. He was always thinking of ways to better the situation. Even after he was out of office he still worked very hard to try to make things better for all Alaskans. So that's a true story."

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