Researching Robert Hunter

Garcia and others formed the Grateful Dead in 1965, and some time later began working with lyrics that Hunter had written. Garcia invited him to join the band as a lyricist, and Hunter contributed substantially to many of their albums, beginning with Aoxomoxoa in 1969. Over the years Hunter wrote lyrics to a number of the band's signature pieces, including "Dark Star", "Ripple", "Truckin'", "China Cat Sunflower", and "Terrapin Station". Hunter was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with the Grateful Dead in 1994, and is the only non-performer to be inducted as a member of a band. Upon his death, Rolling Stone described him as "one of rock's most ambitious and dazzling lyricists".

From the 1860s Hunter was interested in conservation of public open spaces, and worked with other pioneers in this field, including Octavia Hill and Hardwicke Rawnsley. After acting as adviser to Hill in her campaigns to save Hampstead Heath and other open spaces, he worked with Rawnsley to save land in the English Lake District from industrial development. In 1893 the three campaigners agreed to set up a national body to acquire vulnerable properties and preserve them for the nation. At Hunter's suggestion it was entitled "the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty", generally known simply as "the National Trust". Hunter was the founding chairman of the trust's executive board.

From 1882 until the year of his death Hunter was solicitor to the General Post Office. His negotiations in that capacity were estimated to have saved the British taxpayer many millions of pounds.

Hunter was born in Dodge City in western Kansas. He earned his Bachelor of Business Administration and Master of Business Administration degrees from Abilene Christian University. He also holds honorary doctorates from Pepperdine University near Malibu, California, Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth, the University of St. Thomas in Houston, and the Southern Baptist-affiliated Hardin-Simmons University, also in Abilene.

On 9 August 1986, Hunter won a special election with 50.5 percent of the ballots cast to fill the District 71 House seat vacated by the Democrat Gary E. Thompson, who resigned on 2 June. Hunter became the first Republican since Reconstruction to represent Abilene and Taylor County in the state legislature.

Hunter and his wife, the former Shirley M. Long (born c. 1933), have resided in Abilene since 1956. The 57,000-square-foot Hunter Welcome Center, named in their honor, was dedicated at ACU in 2009.