Richard Baxter

Richard H. Baxter was one of the youngest of the 73 participants at the 1946 Central City, Colo., meeting that created AAPOR.

Then a graduate student at the University of Iowa, he was present for other important moments in public opinion. In 1948, he worked with Elmo Roper on Roper’s CBS television program, “Presidential Straws in the Wind,” reviewing opinion poll results and interviewing potential voters.

Baxter earned a Ph.D from Columbia University, and spent his research career at the Roper Organization, where he was Senior Vice President. He served as AAPOR’s President in 1970-71, as well as having been Secretary-Treasurer, Conference Chair, Chair of the Nominating Committee and Editor of the AAPOR Conference Proceedings, all through the turbulent period of the late 1960s and early 1970s. He was also elected President of the New York City Market Research Council in 1968-69.

Baxter is an AAPOR Honorary Life Member, and now lives in Virginia.