Guy Martin · 2019 Honoree

In the spring of 1981 Guy Martin was at a professional turning point with various options for working in widely different places – in Colorado, where he had grown up and had gone to college and law school; in Alaska, where he had been a college professor and lawyer, becoming an expert on issues relating to native land rights, conservation and state and national resource management; and in Washington, DC, where he had come to serve as Legislative Assistant to Congressman Nick Begich and had helped create the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. He had opened the first Alaska state office in DC and had, for four years, served as Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Land and Water Resources in the Carter administration. There were many tempting possibilities but, after three weeks skiing out west, he and his late wife, Nancy, agreed that they wanted to stay in DC. Work possibilities were abundant here and, most important, they both realized that the city – and in particular Capitol Hill – had become home.

Today, almost 40 years later, Guy has no regrets about that decision. Becoming a partner in the law firm of Perkins Coie provided ample opportunity for continuing his work dealing with the relationship between natural resource management and government. And over the years, his connection to the Capitol Hill community has deepened. In 1987, Guy and Nancy purchased an elegant house on Lincoln Park from retiring Alaska Senator Ted Stevens. There they raised two daughters, Sorin and Summer, and Nancy hosted classical musicales with Guy being, as he put it, “organizer and prop mover.” They served as co-chairs for the annual Capitol Hill Classic, the footrace that raises funds for local public schools, and organized Annual Giving for Capitol Hill Day School, where Guy also served on the Board. Guy joined the board of the Folger Theater Guild when Michael Kahn was raising awareness of and support for the Folger Theater.

In 2005 Guy joined the board of the Old Naval Hospital Foundation. Because of his experience with relevant legal and regulatory issues, he was an ideal person to lead the drive to turn the dilapidated century-old federally-owned building on Pennsylvania Avenue into an asset for the community. His grasp of and attention to legal detail, his skill as a negotiator and his energy and determination were essential to the long, sometimes difficult process that resulted in 2011 in the opening of the Hill Center, “a vibrant home for education, culture and city life on Capitol Hill.” There, amidst the bushes, flowers and trees that surround the building is a plaque in memory of Nancy Martin, who died of cancer in 2010, shortly before the Hill Center opened.