Frank Morrison, former Nebraska governor

Frank Morrison, the Democratic governor in a predominantlyRepublican Nebraska during the tumultuous '60s, has died. He was 98.

Mr. Morrison died early Monday in McCook, 200 miles west ofLincoln, after a battle with cancer, a nursing supervisor at McCookCommunity Hospital said.

Mr. Morrison served as governor from 1961 to 1967. His dream wasto serve in Congress, yet he was never elected in five tries between1948 and 1970.

But the fact that a Democrat who was opposed to the Vietnam Warand capital punishment could be elected governor in Nebraska in the1960s attests to Mr. Morrison's charisma, said former governor andU.S. Sen. Jim Exon, who encouraged Mr. Morrison to run for governor.

"Frank Morrison was just one of those individuals that as you gotto know him, you couldn't help but like him whether you were aDemocrat or a Republican," he said.

Then-President Lyndon Johnson persuaded Mr. Morrison not to seek afourth two-year term as governor in 1966, and instead run againstCarl Curtis for the Senate. He lost, then lost another Senate bid in1970.

He was appointed Douglas County defender in 1970, and was involvedin representing two black men who were convicted of murdering a whiteofficer.

Mr. Morrison remained active through his senior years, speakingout against the war in Iraq and opposing capital punishment as awitness during legislative hearings.

"Some people think what we're doing in Iraq is legal. Well, it'sabsolutely unconstitutional and illegal," Mr. Morrison said at ademonstration last year.

In 2000, when Mr. Morrison was 95, his dream of a monumentcelebrating the convergence of the Oregon, Mormon and Californiatrails in Nebraska came true with the construction of the GreatPlatte River Road Archway Monument in Kearney.

After mulling the idea for decades, Mr. Morrison started work onthe $60 million archway and its series of multimedia exhibits in themid-1990s. Although it was criticized by some as gaudy, Mr. Morrisonsaid it served to bring history alive and celebrate Nebraska's rolein the movement west.

Morrison's wife, Maxine, whom he married in 1936, died just lastmonth. She was 88.