Mark O. Hatfield, the former governor and senator who transformed Oregon’s economy and landscape while becoming one of the nation’s most prominent skeptics of military might, died about 6 p.m. in Portland at the age of 89.

Hatfield, who had been in ill health for several years, died at a care home in Portland. His family did not have an immediate cause of death. He had lived in Oregon since his retirement from the Senate at the end of 1996 but had recently spent several months in a hospital at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md.

Through nearly five decades in public office, Hatfield was both Oregon's most durable politician and — after his rise to the chairmanship of the Senate Appropriations Committee in 1981 — its most important.

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The Republican lawmaker brought the state more than $3 billion in federal money that affected how Oregonians work, play and commute. He helped transform Oregon Health & Science University into a nationally recognized research institution that is now Portland's largest employer. And he fueled creation of the region's lauded and widely imitated light rail system.

He is survived by his wife, Antoinette, and by four children: Elizabeth, Theresa, Mark and Visko and by several grandchildren.