Ralph Elihu Becker
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Ralph Elihu Becker, Sr. (January 29, 1907 – August 24, 1994) was an American Ambassador to Honduras from 1976–1977 under the Ford administration. He was a founding trustee of the National Center for the Performing Arts and served as its general counsel during the Eisenhower administration and until 1976.
Ralph Becker was born on January 29, 1907, in New York City, to a tailor from Lithuania and a mother from Minsk. He earned his law degree from St. John's University law school in 1928. He served in the Judge Advocate General's Corps in World War II, attached to the 30th Infantry Division. He landed in Normandy after D-Day and won a Bronze Star, along with medals from the Belgian, French, and Dutch governments.
After his discharge, he went to Washington, D. C. and became the chairman for the Young Republican National Committee. In the 1960s, he joined an Arctic expedition that he had helped sponsor, and brought back a pair of polar bears as a gift for the National Zoo in Washington, D.C.. From 1976 to 1977 he was rewarded for his lifetime of loyal service to the Republican party with an appointment as Ambassador to Honduras. He died of congestive heart failure on August 24, 1994, and was buried soon afterwards in Arlington National Cemetery.
His son Ralph Elihu Becker, Jr. was elected Mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah in 2007.
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- 1907 births
- 1994 deaths
- American people of Lithuanian descent
- American people of Belarusian descent
- Ambassadors of the United States to Honduras
- Burials at Arlington National Cemetery
- American military personnel of World War II
- United States Army officers
- College Republican National Committee chairs
- Recipients of the Bronze Star Medal
- American diplomat stubs