City loses ‘greatest mayor’

Neal Fosseen, who spent seven years as Spokane’s first modern mayor and nearly five times that long as its congenial “mayor emeritus,” is dead at 95.

Once the nation’s youngest Eagle Scout, Fosseen was a longtime patron of Scouting programs in the Inland Northwest, and a local camp was named in his honor.

A Marine lieutenant colonel during World War II, he was a consistent supporter of locally based military personnel. Each spring, the Fosseen Award is given to the local military unit that does the most for community service.

Fosseen also helped forge an international bond between Spokane and Japan through a Sister City relationship with Nishinomiya. A room is named for him at Mukogawa Fort Wright Institute, where Japanese come to a campus on a former Army post to learn the English language and American culture.

“He was probably the greatest mayor in Spokane history and an idol of mine,” said Spokane Mayor Jim West, who ordered the city’s flags flown at half-staff for the next week.

“He was always a gentleman,” said former Mayor Sheri Barnard. “I don’t ever remember seeing him angry.”

Daughter-in-law Sharon Fosseen said he died Saturday of complications from a stroke he suffered some four years ago. Funeral services are scheduled for 4 p.m. Thursday at St. John’s Cathedral, with Dean John Smylie officiating.

Born in Yakima in 1908, Fosseen was 8 when his family moved to Spokane. At 12, he was an Eagle Scout, achieving that rank in just 11 months. His interest in scouting would continue the rest of his life, and he’d eventually serve as the Inland Empire Council’s president and executive board member.

He graduated from Lewis and Clark High School in 1925 and the University of Washington in 1929, and he went on to work at the family business, Washington Brick & Lime Co. A lieutenant in the Marine reserves before World War II, he was activated in 1942 and served until 1945. When he returned from the South Pacific, Fosseen went back to his post as president of the brick company.

When that company was sold in 1957, Fosseen remained in Spokane as a consultant for the new owners and worked in other business ventures. He also served as a regent for Gonzaga University and a member of the Association of Washington Industries.

Fosseen didn’t set out to be mayor of Spokane. He was a bank executive in the spring of 1960 when city business leaders tapped him to run for the office that voters had just created. For 60 years, the city had been governed by five elected commissioners who appointed one of their members as mayor, but a coalition of city employees and business leaders became convinced the system was outmoded and too prone to political pressure.

In a 1999 interview, Fosseen recalled being summoned to the office of his brother-in-law, Bill Witherspoon, president of Old National Bank, in March 1960 and finding three other business leaders waiting for him. They told him he should run for mayor as part of his civic responsibility.

“I thought to myself, ‘How am I going to get out of this thing?’ ” Fosseen related in the interview.

As it turned out, he couldn’t. Everyone he suggested as an alternative was already running for the new City Council. He said he’d run if they would. After Fosseen and most of that business-backed slate was elected in a May election, he discovered that the “part-time” mayor’s job required 60 to 70 hours a week.

From that post, Fosseen worked tirelessly to reinvigorate downtown and reshape the community, said Jack Geraghty, who went to work as Fosseen’s aide in 1961. When voters turned down a bond issue to build the terminal at the new Spokane International Airport, he worked with county commissioners on bonds that didn’t need voter approval.

“He believed the city needed a modern airport,” Geraghty said. “He had a lot of courage.”

He also helped lead efforts to establish a Sister City relationship with Nishinomiya in 1962. After that city’s mayor visited Spokane, Fosseen and his wife visited Nishinomiya – at their own expense, short-circuiting any possible complaints from the financially conservative council and public. Some 24 years later, the emperor of Japan honored Fosseen for his work in creating the sister city and protecting Japanese Americans in Eastern Washington.

In 1967, Fosseen stepped down as mayor and was replaced by City Councilman David Rodgers, but he kept active in city affairs for the rest of the century. The council gave him the honorary title of mayor emeritus in 1968.

“He liked the title, and we gave it to him,” Rodgers said. ” ‘Conscientious’ is the best word I can think of to describe him.”

He joined other business executives pushing for Spokane’s World’s Fair, and he took part in negotiations with the Great Northern railroad that were needed to get the land for the fair.

“He led the old guard for Expo,” Geraghty recalled.

He was an avid swimmer, squash player and walker, and he was a frequent world traveler with Helen, his wife of nearly 68 years. Sometimes they would travel for months, but they always returned to Spokane. One son, Neal Randolph Fosseen Jr., also lives in Spokane, and a second, William Roger Fosseen, lives on Mercer Island, Wash. They have four grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

Longtime friend Ed Kiemle recalled Fosseen would stop in almost every day on the walk from his home at the Spokane Club to his office at the ONB Building.

“He always had a list of things he wanted to do or wanted to talk about,” Kiemle said. “He was always available to help out, no matter who called him. This was his home, and he wanted to see things get better.”

But Fosseen’s contacts extended far beyond the business crowd, he said.

“He’d go down and sit in the boiler room (of the ONB building) and talk with the janitors and the building engineers,” Kiemle said. “He got a real feel for the community.”

West recalled that when he was a young state legislator in the 1980s, Fosseen would send him a letter at the start of each session with some thoughts about what the community needed. When Geraghty became mayor, he, too, received notes from his mentor.

“He would give me advice, and he would always say, ‘You can take it or leave it.’ ” Geraghty said.

He even helped people he didn’t necessarily agree with, Barnard said. When she first ran for mayor in 1989, Fosseen sent her $25 with a note that he couldn’t support her, but “he honored my commitment,” she said. After she won, he would compliment her on her handling of the job.

“Spokane is really going to miss him a lot,” Barnard said.