booth gardner - Washington Secretary of State

downturns, state government was balancing its budget on a two-legged stool. Editorialists
said the crisis was a golden opportunity to push for an income tax, given Gardner’s
connections to the business community and astounding popularity with the proletariat.
Wherever he went that winter, people kept shouting, “Hey, Booth. You’re doing a
great job.” Habitually gruff Shelby Scates of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer declared, “We’ve
got a phenom in the statehouse.”
In the parlance of the newsroom, Gardner was “good copy” – a story-making
machine. Whole forests fell to feed the presses and ink arrived by the tanker truck as a
diverse cast of gifted writers chronicled the adventures of Booth and his retinue. Besides
Scates, the P-I’s coverage featured Mike Layton, Neil Modie, Laura Parker and Joel Connelly.
The Times fielded Larsen, Lyle Burt, Doug Underwood, Don Duncan and Walter Hatch.
The Tacoma News Tribune’s team included Callaghan and Rick Seifert. Ammons at the
AP and Gordon Schultz at United Press International were two of the best wire-service
reporters the state had ever seen, while Bob Partlow covered the Capitol for Gannett News
Service. Adele Ferguson’s columns appeared in dailies and weeklies all over the state.
Henry Gay, the Menckenesque sage of Shelton, was a big league writer in a small town.
David Brewster’s Seattle Weekly, which made its mark covering Dixy Lee Ray’s meltdown,
featured the witheringly witty Rebecca Boren. One day, she stood watch in Gardner’s outer
office as “a ghastly procession of state budget experts” trooped out of “Macbooth’s” inner
sanctum. “First came State Revenue director Bud Shinpoch, his expression frozen, looking
neither to the right nor to the left. He was followed by Senate Ways & Means chair Jim
McDermott, his face as gray as his charcoal suit… Out, out brief candle. March 28 turned
out to be the day the 1985 legislative session died. While Governor Gardner was out doing
his prairie-dog routine – popping up in Sunnyside schools – his money mavens were being
whacked by the week’s bad news. …The governor’s panicky response drew pans from
political pros across the spectrum.”
* * *
Everyone took a two-day
pass in the middle of the battle of
the budget to note Greg Barlow’s
promotion to brigadier general to
oversee Washington’s Army National
Guard. It was the No. 2 post in a Military
Department headed by Spellman
appointee George Coates. Clearly the
model of a modern major general,
Coates made the appointment with the
blessings of his new commander-inchief.
He praised the former Green Beret
Booth and Barlow. The inscription says, “To our commander in chief:
Thanks for your total support! Greg. Annual Training 1987.”
Gardner family album.
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