Governor Vesta M. Roy

VESTA M. ROY was born in Detroit, Michigan. She served as a Rockingham, County, New Hampshire Commissioner, and as a member of both the New Hampshire House of Representatives (1973-75) and Senate (1978-86). As President of the Senate, she assumed the office of governor briefly in an acting capacity upon the death of then-Governor Hugh Gallen shortly before the inauguration of Governor-elect John H. Sununu. Although she was governor for only one week, she holds the status of being the first Republican female governor in U.S. history. Roy was also an advisor to the New Hampshire presidential campaign offices of Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, and George H.W. Bush. She died at her home in Kenmore, New York at the age of seventy-six and is buried in Lowell, Massachusetts.