H. A. Boucher

Who was H. A. Boucher?

Henry Aristide "Red" Boucher, Jr. was the fourth Lieutenant Governor of Alaska from 1970 to 1974. He had also served as mayor of Fairbanks, Alaska from 1966 to 1970, and in the Alaska House of Representatives

Born in Nashua, New Hampshire to Henry Aristide Boucher, Sr. and Helen Isabel Cameron, Boucher's father died shortly after his birth from lingering effects of exposure to mustard gas in World War I at the Battle of Verdun in 1916. His mother was one of the first female chief petty officers in the United States Navy. He earned the nickname "Red" after he met President Franklin D. Roosevelt as a child who reportedly told him, "They ought to call you Red." in reference to his red hair. After his mother developed multiple sclerosis, he and his brother were placed in St. Vincent's Orphanage in Fall River, Massachusetts. Boucher enlisted in the Navy at age 17, served aboard the USS Enterprise in the Pacific during World War II as an expert signalman and a meteorologist and achieved the rank of Chief Petty Officer. He served during the Battle of Midway and numerous other battles for a total of twenty years in the Navy, including a stint on the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga as chief petty officer for communications and meteorology.