Background
Keith Stratton McHugh was born on February 22, 1895 in Fort Collins, Colorado. He was the son of Peter Joseph McHugh, a physician, and Lerah Gilette Stratton.
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Keith Stratton McHugh
Edit ProfileEducation
McHugh attended public schools in Fort Collins and graduated from the University of Wisconsin with a B. S. in chemical engineering in 1917.
Career
After America entered World War I, McHugh joined the United States Army and served as a captain with the American Expeditionary Force in France. In 1919, McHugh went to work for American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T) as a clerk and advanced through various engineering positions. In 1921, he was made a general commercial engineer at an AT&T subsidiary, Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone, in Washington, D. C. In 1925, McHugh transferred to New York Telephone Company, as commercial manager of its upstate region; in 1927, he was made commercial manager of its Long Island region. McHugh was appointed vice-president in charge of public relations in early 1929 and was transferred back to AT&T corporate headquarters in New York City later that year. He was a commercial engineer at AT&T until 1934, and then successively was assistant vice-president, vice-president in charge of administration (1938), vice-president in charge of public relations (1946), and vice-president in charge of accounts and finance. In 1949, McHugh was elected to the New York Telephone Company board of directors; later that year he was appointed the company's president. McHugh was president through 1959, during which time he helped the company expand to serve the postwar demand for increased telephone service. During his tenure, its telephones increased from 4. 7 million to 6. 1 million. McHugh served the Greater New York Fund and numerous other civic organizations. Through this service he became a close friend of Nelson Rockefeller and strongly supported his bid to obtain the Republican nomination for governor of New York in 1958. Rockefeller made the state economy an issue in his campaign against Democratic Governor W. Averell Harriman, charging that the Democrats were hostile to business and promising to give business growth and the creation of new job opportunities a high priority if elected. Rockefeller upset the incumbent Harriman by 530, 000 votes.
After Rockefeller was inaugurated, he appointed McHugh head of the New York State Department of Commerce. McHugh resigned from his $150, 000-per-year post at New York Telephone to accept the cabinet position, which paid $85, 000, and was inducted on May 2, 1959. Rockefeller appointed a Wall Street lawyer, Oren L. Root, deputy secretary of commerce. Root had organized and headed the volunteer committees who supported Wendell Willkie's 1940 presidential campaign and had been active since then in Republican politics. Political observers believed McHugh and Root would use the Department of Commerce as a base from which to build support for Rockefeller's efforts to obtain the Republican presidential nomination. McHugh first came to wide public attention after Rockefeller appointed him head of the New York State Committee on Fallout Protection in 1959. On February 17, 1960, McHugh's committee recommended the enactment of legislation that would make fallout shelters mandatory in all residential and commercial buildings by 1963. Homeowners would have to spend from $60 to $500 to construct shelters, and the recommendations would cost nearly $1 billion to implement. Although McHugh's proposals were praised by the New York Times, they were criticized by virtually everyone in New York politics. Rockefeller tried to minimize criticism by modifying McHugh's recommendations. In March 1960, he submitted several bills proposing tax credits to promote voluntary, rather than mandatory, construction of fallout shelters. The New York legislature rejected the proposed legislation the following month. In July 1960, shortly before the Republican National Convention, McHugh and Root helped L. Judson Morehouse, New York Republican party chairman, prepare and publicize a study alleging that Rockefeller would make a better presidential candidate than the frontrunner, Vice-President Richard Nixon. Nixon had enough party support, however, to obtain the nomination on the first ballot, although he lost the general election to Democrat John F. Kennedy. After the fallout shelter fiasco and Rockefeller's failure to obtain the 1960 presidential nomination, McHugh concentrated on New York State Department of Commerce matters. He set up a task force to streamline government operations regarding business regulation and to attract businesses to the state.
He also established Department of Commerce branch offices in Los Angeles, Chicago, and Montreal, as well as a liaison office with the European Common Market in Brussels, and for Asian businesses in Tokyo. The opening of these offices furnished well-publicized speech-making opportunities for Rockefeller. McHugh supported Rockefeller's 1962 campaign for reelection against the Democratic candidate, U. S. Attorney Robert Morgenthau. Rockefeller campaigned on a pledge of "no new taxes, " which McHugh later came to regret, since this resulted in increased state borrowing to pay for Rockefeller's many new government programs. McHugh resigned from his cabinet position in 1966, but he continued to remain active in other state posts. He held a total of fifty committee and board appointments. In 1968, Rockefeller appointed McHugh head of a task force to study problems concerning the reconversion of the state economy after the end of the Vietnam War. McHugh's Post Vietnam Planning Committee warned that one-quarter of the state's 280, 000 defense-plant workers would be out of jobs after the Vietnam War ended and recommended the creation of new state agencies to facilitate postwar economic adjustment. McHugh had little involvement in political matters after Rockefeller lost the 1968 Republican presidential nomination to Richard Nixon. He died in New York City.
Achievements
Politics
McHugh was Nelson Rockefeller's liaison with the business community. He personified the leadership of the liberal-internationalist wing of the Republican party: he lived on the East Coast; he headed a giant corporation; he proposed an active government role in economic matters; and he supported Nelson Rockefeller's bids for the Republican presidential nomination. Although Rockefeller and McHugh claimed success in promoting New York State's economic growth during the late 1950's and 1960's, this success resulted mainly from national economic factors outside of their control. The recession of the later Eisenhower administration was succeeded by the economic growth (and inflation) of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, which carried New York State along with the rest of the nation.
Connections
On August 16, 1917, McHugh married Frances Brown; they had no children. Frances McHugh died in 1956, and on December 4, 1957, he married Dorothy Barbee Miller. They adopted one child.
