Ralph Andrew Jespersen (May 9, 1925 – October 17, 2016) was a dairyman and provincial politician from

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. He served as a member of the

Legislative Assembly of Alberta The Legislative Assembly of Alberta is the deliberative assembly of the province of Alberta, Canada. It sits in the Alberta Legislature Building in Edmonton. The Legislative Assembly currently has 87 members, elected first past the post from sin ...

from 1967 to 1971, sitting with the governing Social Credit caucus.

Political career

Jespersen ran for a seat to the Alberta Legislature in the

1967 Alberta general election The 1967 Alberta general election was held on May 23, 1967, to elect members of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta to the 16th Alberta Legislature. The election was called after the 15th Alberta Legislature was prorogued on April 11, 1967, and ...

. He was nominated as the Social Credit candidate in the Stony Plain electoral district on February 13, 1967. In the nomination race he defeated longtime incumbent

Cornelia Wood Cornelia Lucinda Railey Wood (April 14, 1892 – December 26, 1985) was a provincial level politician from Alberta, Canada. She served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta twice the first time being from 1940 to 1955 and the se ...

. He would face Wood again in the general election as well as two other candidates. Jespersen would take just 36% of the popular vote to win the tight four way race along with defeating Wood for the second time who finished a distant fourth place running as an Independent Social Credit candidate. Jespersen ran for a second term in the

1971 Alberta general election The 1971 Alberta general election was the seventeenth general election held in the Province of Alberta, Canada on August 30, 1971, to elect seventy-five members of the Alberta Legislature to form the 17th Alberta Legislative Assembly. The Progre ...

but finished second being defeated by Progressive Conservative candidate William Purdy despite gaining a modest increase in vote percentage. Jespersen died on October 17, 2016, at the age of 91.

References

External links

Legislative Assembly of Alberta Members Listing
{{DEFAULTSORT:Jespersen, Ralph Alberta Social Credit Party MLAs 2016 deaths 1925 births