WATSON, Emmett

1918 - 2001  (82 years)

• Name	WATSON, Emmett  [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20]
  Born	22 Nov 1918	Seattle, King, Washington, USA   [1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 21]
  Gender	Male
  Died	11 May 2001	Seattle, King, Washington, USA   [1, 3, 4, 9, 11, 12, 14, 15]
  Person ID	I46582	Brasfield ~ Brassfield Genealogies
  Last Modified	9 Jan 2022

  
  

  Father	MCWHIRT, Garfield M,   b. 26 Jan 1880, Crawford, Kansas, USA ,   d. 2 Dec 1925, Florence, Fremont, Colorado, USA  (Age 45 years)
  Relationship	natural
  Mother	CORNTHWAITE, Lena,   b. Aug 1886, England ,   d. 22 Mar 1920, Richmond Highlands, King, Washington, USA  (Age ~ 33 years)
  Relationship	natural
  Married	Abt 1907
  Family ID	F3888	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

  Father	WATSON, John Alexander,   b. 8 Oct 1879, Omaha, Nebraska, USA
  Relationship	Adopted
  Mother	BURNS, Elizabeth,   b. Abt 1878, Ireland
  Relationship	Adopted
  Family ID	F4062	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

  Family	LEA, Elizabeth May,   b. 18 Jul 1919, Portland, Oregon ,   d. 13 Nov 2006, Seattle, King, Washington, USA  (Age 87 years)
  Married	22 Dec 1942	King, Washington, USA   [6]
  Divorced	10 Mar 1976	King, Washington, USA   [7]
  Children	1. Living   2. WATSON, Nancy Elaine,   b. 3 Aug 1948, Seattle, King, Washington, USA ,   d. 25 Jul 1997, Fort Lauderdale, Broward, Florida, USA  (Age 48 years)  [natural]
  Last Modified	9 Jan 2022
  Family ID	F15215	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

• Event Map

  Born - 22 Nov 1918 - Seattle, King, Washington, USA Married - 22 Dec 1942 - King, Washington, USA Divorced - 10 Mar 1976 - King, Washington, USA Died - 11 May 2001 - Seattle, King, Washington, USA  = Link to Google Earth

  
  

• Photos

  3000 (71)

  
  

• Notes

  Emmett was taken in by the Watson family when he was 14 months old. They raised him and he always used their name. As a younster, an infection caused some deafness, and polio left him with a slight limp. Johanna C. McWhirt - died 3/1997 in Salt Lake City - age 55 (Unknown if any relation) Obituary, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 12, May 2001: Lesser Seattle's press secretary Emmett Watson dies at 82 By John Hahn, Seattle Post-Intelligencer Reporter Lesser Seattle is. By a whole lot, with the death yesterday of Emmett Watson, this town's favorite native-son columnist and the man whose not-so-gentle xenophobia created the Lesser Seattle movement. Watson, who often referred to himself in self-deprecating print as Watsen, Watkins, Wadkens and other monikers, had been in the intensive-care unit of Virginia Mason Hospital Medical Center with a burst abdominal aneurysm discovered in March. He underwent surgery there March 21, friends reported. His death was due to complications from the surgery. Watson was 82. In his career he worked at the now defunct Seattle Star, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and The Seattle Times, his most recent newspaper. From his birth near the Duwamish mudflats to his recent participation in the Seattle newspaper strike-he wrote for the strike paper, the Seattle Union Record-Watson was classic Seattle, sort of laid back, but as well politically connected as he was sometimes politically incorrect, calling things as he saw them. "He was widely recognized as being entertaining and knowledgeable about everything in Seattle," said a longtime friend, U.S. District Court Judge William Dwyer. "But Emmett also was one of the bravest writers around here. He was very much opposed to, and wrote about, the war in Vietnam. And he got angry at what he saw as deception by our government officials. He was angered, too, Dwyer noted, at Watergate and those responsible. "He had a keen sense of indignation and was fearless." Another close friend and former P-I colleague, Fred Brack, said: "He offended certain classes of people without apology. The greedy, the self-righteous, the politically conservative and Major League Baseball's owners all suffered in his column." As to his indignations, Brack noted that "during the Age of Aquarius, when it seemed America's youth and older generations were at war, an editor at the Post-Intelligencer posted a notice forbidding facial hair. Watson immediately began growing a beard in support of his younger colleagues. The notice came down." This fellow with the great white shock of Cuisinart'd hair and the Mount Rushmore face knew everyone who was anyone, drawing not only on his native-son status but more than 50 years of newspapering. He wrote for the Post-Intelligencer for 32 years, after being hired away from the Seattle Times, to which he eventually returned in 1983 after a brief stint as communications director at the Pacific Institute. He delighted and debunked with a broad and bodacious pen, but is perhaps remembered by many for his creation and periodic crusades in the name of Lesser Seattle, aimed at emigre Californians, New Yorkers and the rest of us who he felt were overloading lifeboat Seattle. "Keep the Bastards Out!" was his movement motto, although he conceded softly that he was a closet Seattle booster. He was known to his reading public, too, for his walking with and writing about a succession of pet poodles, all named Tiger, a sort of Steinbeck on the Sound, extending the scope to trips in the private plane he learned to fly in middle age. In recent months, Watson could be seen doing his trademark shamble along the sidewalks of downtown, or Capitol Hill or Queen Anne, where he could walk no more than a half-block without stopping to talk to someone he recognized. He was wired to the motherboard of information through a network of sources as well as his own good ol' boy way of coaxing information out of folks. It was in such a way that he scooped the world press in 1961, with the exclusive on Ernest Hemingway's real cause of death-suicide. But the Emmett Watson generations knew and read was rarely in the news himself. He and his journalistic legmen-most all of his assistants or secretaries were women-gathered news items daily. Sometimes, as you might suspect, when there seemed not enough to fill that 1,000-word hole, "he would say: 'Let's go to lunch!" said Carol Barnard Ottenberg, one of his former P-I assistants. "He's talk at lunch about sports and all sorts of things, but then he's stare blankly into space and you knew he was ruminating." He never missed a deadline, and he always wrote his own material, she said. Bill Asbury, a former P-I editor, recalled that Watson was one of the first and strongest voices for the renaming of King County after the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. "He used his longer, thematic columns for things that really mattered to him," Asbury said. "One was saving the Pike Place Market." P-I columnist Art Thiel, who knew Watson for many years, said: "All the journalists in Seattle who have come after Emmett owe him a debt of gratitude for the standard he set for wit, for sincerity and for good honest journalism. In his heyday he was a must-read for Seattle; you always wanted to know what was going on with Emmett." Watson "openly admitted to folly, gullibility, and most of the seven deadly sins," according to P-I colleague Brack. "The slovenliness of his office, buying high and selling low when trying to score in the silver market, an addiction to garage sales, a pronounced tendency to procrastinate-all these and many more were offered up as examples of deep and enduring flaws. "His friends knew that if he borrowed a book-or, for the matter, a frying pan or garden hose-it was lost to them forever," Brack wrote. "Conversely, anything he owned, including a steady procession of used and remarkably unreliable vehicles was theirs for the asking." And while he counted numerous celebrities among friends and confidantes, he particularly admired folks who "had the courage to confront injustice and help those who needed help," Brack wrote. "During the WTO troubles last year, Watson was having dinner with his daughter and a friend in one of Belltown's leading restaurants. He stepped outside for a cigarette, fell into a conversation with a woman protester from the East who was passing by, and invited her to join the table and continue their talk." A side of Watson that few experienced was related to Dwyer, who skied, played tennis and socialized with him for more than 40 years. In a speech delivered in absentia at a recent Washington News Council "roast" honoring Emmett, Dwyer wrote that his friend was one of the best pilots in a select category of "surviving pilots who are both deaf and absentminded. If you haven't flown with Watson in a small plane in a thunderstorm, while he tries to remember whether a catchy phrase was written by Ring Lardner or Red Smith, you have missed one of the thrills of aviation!" Watson often wrote about how newspapering wasn't his first love. He wanted to be a professional baseball player. The orphaned son of poor working-class parents, he grew up with youngsters who habitually climbed the fence at Civic Field (now the site of High School Memorial Stadium) to watch baseball games. He later played catcher for pitchers Fred Hutchinson and Dewey Soriano at Franklin High, where he was graduated in 1937. Hutchinson played for the Rainiers right out of high school, but Watson went to the University of Washington, where he played catcher for the Huskies, and later caught some semi-pro ball. A hearing impairment dating to childhood kept him out of the armed services during World War II, and he wore first one, then two hearing aids in later life. He got his shot at pro baseball with the Rainiers, but played only two days with the team. After a brief stint as a longshoreman, he got a sportswriting job on the old Seattle Star in 1946. He felt lucky, he wrote later, to be paid for watching baseball. While at the Star, Watson survived a bout with polio. When the paper folded in 1947, he moved to The Seattle Times. In 1950, the P-I lured him away from the Times with a higher salary offer and a chance, he said later, to work with a staff that was "a lot looser" and more fun. And he could write hard, morning leads on sports stories instead of soft second-day leads for an afternoon paper. In the mid-1950s, his column morphed out of Sports into a thrice-weekly items column. First called "This Is Our City," it later simply carried his name. Emmett Watson was called "one of the greats" by two contemporaries-Jimmy Breslin of the New York Daily News, and Herb Caen, the originator of the item-column format, of the San Francisco Chronicle. Watson, who also wrote four books, including "Digressions of a Native Son" (Pacific Institute), also received the Distinguished Service Award of the Western Washington Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists in 1998. He is survived by his daughter, Lea Watson, of Seattle and his former wife, Betty, also of Seattle, and a niece, Pat Coryell of Ogden, Utah. Item, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 15 May 2001: Services set for Emmett Watson A public celebration of Emmett Watson's life will be held next Monday at 3 p.m. in Town Hall, 1119 Eighth Ave. in Seattle. The event will be open to all, said his daughter, Lea. The longtime newspaper columnist, who worked for The Seattle Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer, died Friday of complications from a burst aneurysm March 21. Lea Watson asked that remembrances in her father's name be donated to Sundown M Ranch, a rehabilitation facility, P.O. Box 217, Selah, WA 98942.

  
  

• Sources

  [S221] Web: Obituary Daily Times Index, 1995-Current, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2012;). death date: 11 May 2001 death place: Seattle, King, Washington, USA Name: Emmett Watson birth date: 22 Nov 1918 birth place: Seattle, King, Washington, USA [S1057] U.S. Public Records Index, 1950-1993, Volume 1, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2010;). residence date: 1982 residence place: Seattle, WA Name: Emmett Watson birth date: 22 Nov 1918 birth place: Seattle, King, Washington, USA [S6184] U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations Inc; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2011;), Database online. Record for Emmett Watson [S914] Global, Find A Grave Index for Burials at Sea and other Select Burial Locations, 1300s-Current, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2012;). Name: Emmett Watson birth date: 22 November 1918 birth place: Seattle, King County, Washington, United States of America death date: 11 May 2001 death place: Seattle, King, Washington, USA [S3007] Washington, Birth Records, 1870-1935, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations Inc; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2010;), Washington State Archives; Olympia, Washington; Washington Births, 1891-1919; Film Info: Various county birth registers. Microfilm. [S2632] Washington, Marriage Records, 1854-2013, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2012;), Washington State Archives; Olympia, Washington; Reference Number: kingcoarchmcvol110_795. [S2634] Washington, Divorce Index, 1969-2014, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Lehi, UT, USA; Date: 2017;), Washington State Archives; Olympia, Washington; Washington State Divorce Indexes, 1969-2014. [S7970] 1940 United States Federal Census, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2012;), Year: 1940; Census Place: Seattle, King, Washington; Roll: m-t0627-04381; Page: 7A; Enumeration District: 40-250A. [S7971] U.S., Find A Grave Index, 1600s-Current, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2012;). [S7972] U.S. Public Records Index, 1950-1993, Volume 2, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2010;). [S7973] Newspapers.com Obituary Index, 1800s-current, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations Inc; Location: Lehi, UT, USA; Date: 2019;), The Los Angeles Times; Publication Date: 14 May 2001; Publication Place: Los Angeles, California, United States of America; URL: https://www.newspapers.com/image/188602431/?article=abf32ca9-b6bf-44fb-8373-17cc81a0b939&focus=0.81354934,0.361827,0.9764383,0. [S3092] U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2015;). [S4490] U.S., World War II Draft Cards Young Men, 1940-1947, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Lehi, UT, USA; Date: 2011;), The National Archives in St. Louis, Missouri; St. Louis, Missouri; WWII Draft Registration Cards for Washington, 10/16/1940-03/31/1947; Record Group: Records of the Selective Service System, 147; Box: 187. [S7974] Washington, Death Index, 1940-2017, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2002;), Washington State Archives; Olympia, Washington; Washington Death Index, 1940-1959, 1965-2017. [S7975] Web: Tacoma, Washington, Obituary Index, 1882-2015, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2011;), Tacoma Public Library; Tacoma, Washington; Obituary Index, 1882-2015. [S7976] U.S., School Yearbooks, 1900-1999, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2010;), "U.S., School Yearbooks, 1880-2012"; School Name: West Seattle High School; Year: 1935. [S7977] U.S., School Yearbooks, 1900-1999, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2010;), "U.S., School Yearbooks, 1880-2012"; School Name: West Seattle High School; Year: 1935. [S7978] U.S., School Yearbooks, 1900-1999, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2010;), "U.S., School Yearbooks, 1880-2012"; School Name: Franklin High School; Year: 1937. [S7979] U.S., School Yearbooks, 1900-1999, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2010;), "U.S., School Yearbooks, 1880-2012"; School Name: University of Washington; Year: 1943. [S7980] U.S., School Yearbooks, 1900-1999, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2010;), "U.S., School Yearbooks, 1880-2012"; School Name: University of Washington; Year: 1942. [S573] Washington Births, 1907-1919, Ancestry.com, (Name: Ancestry.com Operations Inc; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2002;), Database online. Record for Emmett Mc Whirt