Peter Lougheed, the former Albertan Premier who established a political dynasty, died on Thursday, and was remembered for being a larger-than-life politician.
The former premier died from natural causes in Calgary, his family said in a statement. His family announced on Sept. 11 that the former Progressive Conservative leader was in hospital with a serious illness.
Lougheed's leadership began the more than 40-year reign of Conservatives in Alberta after his party toppled the Social Credit party in 1971. He stayed in the job until 1985.
As a statesman, Lougheed spoke eloquently to Alberta's role in the country, once stating, "We didn't think of ourselves as just provincial, we thought of ourselves nationally and we contributed nationally."
Here are some memorable quotes by the former premier:
Peter Lougheed On Being Premier
On being named Canada's best premier by a Policy Options magazine poll:
"The attribute that really pays off is listening ability. Both listen to the people that are involved with you working in the Office of the Premier, listening to the media... listening to your party and the general public."
- "My whole life, 365 days a year, was team sports and I found anything in my public life we really accomplished that was worthwhile we accomplished as a team."
- "I chose provincial politics because I thought that's where the action was and you could get a lot more done"
- "Our whole approach as a political party was to talk not so much negatively, but we wanted to talk about the future of the province and we wanted to talk positively."
- "We got Albertans to think as Canadians. We didn't think of ourselves as just provincial, we thought of ourselves nationally and we contributed nationally - not just in public life and in government but we contributed in a multitude of other ways - the arts and culture and sports, in writing and business and science. All of those were contributions by Albertans into Canada."
- "Because we had the resource revenues (we were able to) save those resource revenues for the future and create the Alberta Heritage Savings Trust Fund."
- "I'm a community person, I think in terms of community before individual. That's the essence of Albertans and to a large extent that's the essence of Canadians as well."
- "I think it's important Albertans know the battles that we had in terms of the jurisdictional battles over the control of energy resources and secondly that we have a government that reflects the various provinces and differences and strengths of the provinces."