Don was known by his comrades as a consistent, loyal, and determined soldier of the revolutionary movement. A number of messages were sent to the meeting, including from Jack Barnes, the national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party, on behalf of the National Committee of the party.

Mildred Solem, active in building the party here in the 1930s and '40s, recalled, "Don was an avid reader and a man who made up his own mind and stood for his deep convictions. And he believed that convictions were to be put into practice. Whether it was selling the Militant, attending a demonstration, or going to a meeting, Donald was always part of it."

A message from Charles Scheer, a leader of the branch and party for many years, pointed out the party was central to Don's life. "Don joined the movement as the postwar upsurge was coming to an end," Scheer wrote. "He stuck with the party through the lean times of the 1950s. Don wholeheartedly welcomed and was inspired by the recruitment of new generations in the 1960s."

John Steele worked as a young man with Don in the early 1960s. He wrote that Don's approach to politics exemplified a proletarian tone and confidence. "When you went with Don on a sale or a petition to get signatures to put an SWP candidate on the ballot, you knew that nobody would get by the corner without being approached. And Don would always be the last one to call it a day."

Donald Peterson was born into a working-class family in 1918 in Duluth, Minnesota. As a young man growing up during the Great Depression of the 1930s and World War II, Don became acquainted firsthand with the ravaging effects of the capitalist system. At the same time he became familiar with the capacities of working people to resist and to forge a working-class movement.

On his own Don read socialist literature and came to view himself as a socialist. One day in 1948 he came across a copy of the Militant on a city bus. He liked what he read and wrote to the Socialist Workers Party in the Twin Cities about joining. Two leaders of the party from Minneapolis, Ray Dunne and Grace Carlson, traveled to Duluth to meet with Don at a meeting of the NAACP addressed by A. Phillip Randolph. From that meeting it was then arranged for Don to move to Minneapolis to live and become active with the party there. From then on he was an unflagging party builder.

Don worked at the Swedish Hospital in Minneapolis for 40 years where he was active in his union, the Service Employees International Union. Jeff Pike, who was a young worker at the hospital in the 1970s, sent a message that explained Don signed him up for the union, after which he joined the Young Socialist Alliance.

Twenty people from Minnesota attended the meeting at the Pathfinder Bookstore. A collection was taken in honor of Don to the Pathfinder Fighting Fund to aid in the publication of Pathfinder books. Some $520 was pledged from participants in the meeting.  
 
 
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