- Born
- Died
- Birth nameHoward Henry Baker Jr.
- Howard Baker is an American politician and diplomat who served as a United States Senator from Tennessee from 1967 to 1985. During his tenure, he rose to the rank of Senate Minority Leader and then Senate Majority Leader. A member of the Republican Party, Baker was the first Republican to be elected to the US Senate in Tennessee since the Reconstruction era.
Known in Washington, D.C., as the 'Great Conciliator', Baker was often regarded as one of the most successful senators in terms of brokering compromises, enacting legislation, and maintaining civility. For example, he had a lead role in the fashioning and passing of the Clean Air Act of 1970 with Democratic senator Edmund Muskie.
Howard Baker sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1980 but dropped out after the first set of primaries. From 1987 to 1988, he served as White House Chief of Staff for President Ronald Reagan. From 2001 to 2005, he was the United States Ambassador to Japan.
- IMDb mini biography by: Tango Papa
- SpousesNancy Kassebaum Baker(December 7, 1996 - June 26, 2014) (his death)Joy Dirksen(December 1951 - 1993) (her death, 2 children)
- RelativesRosebud Baker(Grandchild)
- Republican U.S. senator from Tennessee, 3 January 1967 - 3 January 1985; did not seek reelection to a fourth term in 1984.
- His first wife, Joy, who died in 1993, after a long battle with cancer, was the daughter of Senator Everett Dirksen. His second wife, Nancy Kassebaum Baker (formerly a fellow senator, from Kansas, who served using the name Nancy Landon Kassebaum), whose father, Alfred Landon, was Governor of Kansas from 1933-1937, and the 1936 Republican nominee for President of the United States.
- Stepfather of Richard Kassebaum and Bill Kassebaum.
- Awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom on 26 March 1984.
- U.S. ambassador to Japan, 2001-2005.
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