“Her age wasn’t a factor in what she did,’’ Salinger said. “She never gave up. Until the end, she advocated for public funding. She wanted people to know that democracy and government belong to us.’’
Mrs. Haddock was born Jan. 24, 1910, in Laconia and attended Emerson College before marrying James Haddock. She later worked at a shoe company for 20 years.
After retiring in 1972, Mrs. Haddock became more active in community affairs. She became interested in campaign finance reform after the defeat of the first attempt of Senators John McCain and Russ Feingold to remove unregulated soft money from campaigns in 1995. Inspiration for her cross-country trek came from the Tuesday Morning Academy, a group of women in Dublin who met every Tuesday at 8 a.m. to do ballet exercises and discuss world affairs.
“Sometimes I think it was a fool’s errand, but I think there are more people in this country who know what campaign finance reform means since I started,’’ she told the Associated Press in February 2000.
Covering about 10 miles a day, Mrs. Haddock walked through more than 1,000 miles of desert, climbed the Appalachian Range in blizzard conditions and even skied 100 miles after snowfall made roadside walking impossible. She started in near-obscurity, but was soon discovered by local and national media.
Burke, who co-wrote Mrs. Haddock’s memoir, met her as she walked through Arizona on her way to Washington.
“Doris was one of the youngest people I have ever known,’’ he said yesterday. “She was a little kid about her country — so in love she was with it and so excited for it always.’’
In 2004, Mrs. Haddock jumped into the Senate race on the last day to file after the presumptive Democratic nominee dropped out when his campaign manager was accused of financial fraud. A few months before the election, she officially changed her name to Granny D, but stressed that the D stood for Doris, not her party affiliation. She lost to Gregg 66 to 34 percent.
