Bill Fitch is a man who gets things done. "Bill has very high standards. He's an active person. He's a doer. He's not going to just sit back and just watch," said Alice, his wife.

He is being honored by the West Seattle High School Alumni Association on Thursday, Oct. 20 at the Spirit Dinner and Auction for 10 years of service as the Foundation Vice President. The event is being held at the Hall at Fauntleroy. He has been very active in raising money in support of the school.  Each year the association has recognized an individual or organization who has gone above and beyond n support of the school.  Among past honorees are Dow Constantine, Christy Rowe, former Principal Phil Brockman, Hiawatha Community Center, YMCA & South Seattle Community College.  

Fitch considers his work on the bylaws and his securing of the 501 C3 non-profit status for the foundation as his most significant contributions.

He was born in Oakland California on December 24, in 1925. Fitch said, "Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year," he said chuckling. Alice added wryly, "It's a disaster. He will not celebrate it on a half birthday. It's got to be the 24th." That date has proven to be very useful however since it has meant most of the family has been together to celebrate both occasions.

In 1929 he came to Seattle with his family to move in with his grandmother and two uncles on Alki. "They had jobs," said Fitch. His mother was trained as a school teacher and taught in Herrington, WA. He had an older brother, Lyndon B. Fitch Jr. His father found work with the Nelson Steamship Company and they moved to the 3700 block of Admiral Way. He and his brother both attended Alki Elementary and then later Lafayette Elementary Schools. After moving to the 4100 block of Aikens Avenue Fitch would walk to school. He went on to Madison Junior High School and then West Seattle High School.

While he did not play football he fondly recalls the football team during his high school days whose members included Bob Baugh, Jack Issacson, Dick Barnecut, and Bill Peterson. He recalls putting together a montage of photos of all the players in various sports poses. He played the lead in a play for the Drama Department. He remembers he had a crush on a girl named Pat Faring at the time too.

But surprisingly Fitch never formally graduated from the school.

Not because he wasn't a good student. On the contrary he was a fine student but at that time students could enter school as "mid term students" since due to when you were born you would enter high school mid year. "Because I was 18 in December, I was in the Army in February. I missed the mid-term graduation and also the June graduation. In those days if you were called in to the service they gave you your diploma." He had joined the enlisted reserve in November 1943 and was called up in February, 1944.

In the Army

He began his military service at Fort Lewis in the Army Aviation Cadet Program. "We never got to pre-flight," Fitch said, "because there was such a large group of young people who wanted to be pilots, navigators and bombardiers, they kept moving us around during the war," traveling to Arizona, California and Texas, Montana and Colorado but not on airplanes. Instead they were transported by train. "Then when it was over in 1945, we were the first to be discharged."

Out of the Army, Fitch came back to Seattle. But his early friendship with Al Smith, whom he had grown up with in West Seattle, would later prove pivotal. The two joined the service only weeks apart and during the time they were in the Army Air Corps they would see each other frequently.

Fitch tried attending the University of Washington but completed only one quarter there before leaving in 1945. "The University of Washington just wasn't the right place for me (…)
I was living at home trying to commute out to the University every day." That proved to be too hard to maintain so he and his friend Smith both enrolled at Washington State University in Pullman.
That decision would lead to a lifelong devotion the school and everything it represents. Fitch is so loyal he said, "You take any blood from us and it's crimson," referring to one of the school colors.

Go ask Alice

His experience working on the West Seattle High School newspaper the Chinook and Kimtah annual staff landed him a job with "The Evergreen" the college newspaper where he wrote sports. But a girl at a sorority had caught his eye and he really wanted to get to know her. He figured he might be able to improve his chances by dating her sorority sister, Alice.

"I thought that if I could get a date with Alice that I could somehow maneuver my way in so I could get a date with the other girl," he explained.

Alice even knew of his plan. "There was a guy she had gone with since high school and they were locked in. I thought it was ok to date him because I knew he wasn't going to get anywhere with her. He wasn't even going to get a hello."

Alice at the time was a reporter for and later became one of the Managing Editors for the Evergreen. But Alice grew fond of Bill and the relationship went to a whole new level when she sweetly knitted him a pair of blue mittens. "I thought anyone who would do that is pretty nice."

The two dated for a while, and announced their engagement on April 17, 1949, Easter Sunday. They married on Aug. 28, 1949. Their first son David was born three years and three days later. The couple would go on to have four children, three boys and a girl.

Career years

Fitch graduated from WSU in 1950 and had taken ROTC (Reserve Officers Training Corps) and at that time you could not graduate with a degree in Journalism. But you could graduate with a degree in English Literature with a minor in Journalism. He befriended Dr. Buchanan, head of the English Department, who had a "soft spot for our fraternity Lambda Chi Alpha," which just happened to be next door to Buchanan's home. Buchanan provided a reference for Fitch with publisher Harcourt Brace. He was the Northwest Representative and he sold textbooks to schools.

In April of 1951 he was recalled to active duty in the Air Force, first in Texas then to Ent AFB in Colorado where he became a Public Information Officer. Though he applied again to be a pilot the Air Force instead sent him to Germany as part of the build up of troops in Europe in response to the Soviet Union's military presence. After three years in Munich he came back to a base in Michigan but his commanding office at the time convinced him that his English Lit degree was not that useful to the military, "but if you wanted to make a career out of the Air Force then you better get into something that offers retainability, so I went into nuclear weapons training for a year (…) It was a fantastic development program (…) When I got into the program we were still talking about weapons you could almost climb inside of to clean and when I left, through micro miniaturization the weapons would be no more than 12 inches in diameter." Fitch also served for a year in Thailand.

He stayed in the program until July of 1973, achieved the rank of Colonel, and in the process went to England for three years. Upon his return he was shortly thereafter selected to work at the Pentagon where he served as a nuclear weapons officer. During his tenure there he also managed to get a Masters Degree in Personnel Management from George Washington University by attending night school.

During the later portion of his service he explained, "Everybody was looking for an honorable way out of Vietnam, grasping at theories of warfare that would give us an exit. There were a lot of new weapons coming out." He was witness to the development of the early so called "smart bombs" and other advanced weaponry.

Since Seattle was home, he returned following his service and bought the home where he and Alice still live in West Seattle. Daughter Wendy entered West Seattle High School as a senior. Their youngest son Sam mirrored Bill's school years attending Alki Elementary, then Lafayette Elementary, Madison Junior High and then West Seattle High School.

Out of the military, Fitch found employment with Energy Siting Council, whose function was to be responsible for the construction and operation licenses the state would issue for power plants, where his nuclear training proved to be valuable. He worked with the Council for sixteen years, commuting to Olympia nearly every day.

Still serving, still doing, still traveling

He retired because the legislature reduced the size of the council but this meant he had time to do more traveling and the couple went to South America, China, Russia, Italy and took in the wider world. But Fitch likes to contribute and his retirement has been even busier than his work life. He took up golf, bought a sailboat and stayed physically active. But he also found time to
join the West Seattle High School Foundation, become a member of the Coast Guard Auxiliary a public service effort that promotes public safety where he became the Northern Area Commodore. He also volunteers at the VA Hospital doing checks on equipment in the spinal cord injury area once a week.

Heroes and words to live by

Bill Fitch counts among his personal heroes his own father, Lyndon B. Fitch and President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Of his father he said, "He wasn't an athlete. He was a man who worked six days a week and he brought home the paychecks and did what was right with the family." Eisenhower was "a man who did things the right way."

His faith has guided him throughout his life. He belongs to a men's group that meets every Tuesday morning at 6:30 to read passages from the Bible to pray for people. He and Alice both attend Westside Presbyterian and are active in the church. He, like many finds comfort in the 23rd Psalm. "It's so familiar to so many but there are so many other passages in the Bible you can take comfort and strength from. All of Paul's letters are worth reading over and over." The couple's faith has even led them to teach Sunday School.

As a "doer" Bill Fitch has done a lot and today, even at the age of 85 he's still contributing. That's a life well lived by anyone's measure.