Former Gov. Charlie Baker’s father dies at 97

Charles D. Baker III, a former government official who helped shape his son former Gov. Charlie Baker’s approach to leadership, died Saturday at the North Hill senior living community in Needham at the age of 97, according to news reports. 

According to The Boston Globe, Baker served as president and chairman of the consulting firm Harbridge House, whose clients included the U.S. Departments of Defense and Health and Human Services. 

The Globe reports that he worked in Washington as deputy undersecretary and assistant secretary for policy and international affairs at the U.S. Department of Transportation in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Baker once turned down an opportunity to run for Massachusetts governor as a Republican in 1986. 

Decades later, when his son Charlie Baker won the office in 2014, he became one of the governor’s most trusted advisers, especially during one of the most challenging times in office when the pandemic hit. 

Then-Gov. Baker told reporters then, “I really hope that people have a chance to make sure that they don’t leave anything off the table with respect to their loved ones.”

Also during the pandemic, the governor told WCVB that one of his biggest personal hits was not being able to see his father for nearly four months. 

The pandemic, he said, “dramatically” shrunk the world his father lived in. 

But, he soon returned to his weekly visits, seeking his father’s advice. 

“He’s always been my number one adviser for the one simple reason that he was never in it for anything other than how he could help,” Charlie Baker told the Globe. “There is no angle when I talk to him.”

After leaving Washington, the elder Baker returned to Boston in 1985 to teach at Northeastern University’s business school. 

“The students loved him right away, and he loved the students — there was a great chemistry,” Dan McCarthy, a professor of global management and innovation at Northeastern, told the Globe.  

“He had no airs, no pretense with the students. He treated everybody with the greatest respect, with total dignity, and made everybody feel important. No surprise that he received a couple of teaching awards,” he continued. 

Baker and wife Betty raised three sons, Charlie, Jonathan, and Alex. The Globe says his family will announce a gathering to celebrate his life and work.

“One of my dad’s sayings was, ‘Success is never final,’” former Gov. Baker told the Globe. “You’re not supposed to spike the ball. Just make the things you can make better, better, then somebody else will pick up the ball and go with it.”

Beth Treffeisen is a general assignment reporter for Boston.com, focusing on local news, crime, and business in the New England region.