Mike Gravel: Pentagon Papers, the Alaska Pipeline, and a Rock in a Lake

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Mike Gravel was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1930 to French-Canadian immigrants, spoke only French until seven, and was held back in third grade with undiagnosed dyslexia. He enlisted in 1951, served in the Army Counterintelligence Corps in France, and earned an economics degree at Columbia on the GI Bill. In 1956, broke, he moved to Alaska and worked as a brakeman on the Alaska Railroad. He won an Alaska House seat in 1962 and became speaker after reneging on a promise to Warren Taylor. In 1968, with consultant Joseph Napolitan and the film A Man for Alaska flown to villages, he defeated 81 year old Senator Ernest Gruening while blurring his own antiwar views.

In the Senate he opposed nuclear testing on Amchitka, attempted a five month filibuster against renewing the draft in 1971, and read the Pentagon Papers into the record at a late night subcommittee hearing. In 1973 his amendment barring court challenges to the Trans-Alaska Pipeline passed after Vice President Spiro Agnew broke a 49 to 49 tie. He lost the 1980 primary to Clark Gruening, Ernest's grandson, then faced business failures and bankruptcy in 2004. His 2008 presidential campaign produced viral videos, and in 2020, at 89, he ran again at the urging of teenagers who later founded the Gravel Institute. He was buried at Arlington in June 2023 without a gun salute.

• A summer job as a soda jerk had him handing out flyers for local candidates.
• In 1959 he toured 44 states dressed as Paul Revere to promote tax reform.
• He relied on the Speech or Debate Clause to protect himself when releasing the Pentagon Papers.
• He angered a key backer by voting to approve F-15 sales to Saudi Arabia.
• One 2008 ad showed him silently staring at the camera before throwing a rock into a lake.