[4] He received the 32° of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, Southern Jurisdiction in Yankton, SD on 22 June 1919, and was also a member of Yelduz Shriners[5] in Aberdeen, South Dakota.

On May 9, 1908, Norbeck ran for the South Dakota State Senate from Spink County.

He worked with sculptor Gutzon Borglum to help him create his huge sculpture at Mount Rushmore, convinced presidents Calvin Coolidge and Franklin D. Roosevelt to support it, and shepherded multiple bills through Congress to provide federal funding for it.

[7] As outgoing Republican chairman during the last months of the Herbert Hoover presidency, Norbeck appointed Ferdinand Pecora as Chief Counsel to the U.S. Senate's Committee on Banking and Currency.

Norbeck died of cancer in Redfield, South Dakota, during his third term as United States Senator in 1936.

[2] The Peter Norbeck Summer House, in Custer State Park, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.