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Tag: Booth Gardner

Former Gov. John Spellman visits Capitol.
Former Gov. Spellman visits WA Capitol

Former Gov. Spellman visits WA Capitol

More than three decades after serving as Washington’s governor, John Spellman returned to Olympia to tour the Governor’s Mansion and Capitol and meet with current Gov. Jay Inslee. Before seeing the governor, 90-year-old Spellman, along with two of his sons, a grandson and a granddaughter, stopped by our office to meet with staff, including two alumni from Spellman’s gubernatorial staff – State Archivist Steve Excell, who served as Spellman’s chief of staff, and Patrick McDonald, who was an intern and…

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Need a holiday gift? Buy a book from the Legacy Project!

Need a holiday gift? Buy a book from the Legacy Project!

Looking for holiday gift ideas? Give the gift of a well-written book! Thanks to the Washington State Legacy Project, we can all learn about some very influential Washingtonians. The subjects of these biographies and oral histories include statewide officeholders, congressional leaders, judges and other remarkable citizens. Many of these subjects, in the face of controversy and the most challenging circumstances, refused to give up and inspired change. There are plenty of biographies to choose from, no matter what your interest…

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Olympia bids farewell to late Gov. Booth Gardner

Olympia bids farewell to late Gov. Booth Gardner

Legislators applaud members of the Gardner family sitting in the Senate gallery. (Photo courtesy of Legislative Support Services Photo Department) Olympia paid its final tributes to the late Gov. Booth Gardner Friday with a special joint session of the Legislature in the Senate chambers where the former two-term Democratic governor once served as a 30-something political newcomer. Gov. Jay Inslee, Secretary of State Kim Wyman and other state officials and lawmakers from both parties heard testimonials of Gardner’s lifetime of…

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Remembering Booth Gardner: ‘Civility & public service’

Remembering Booth Gardner: ‘Civility & public service’

(Left to right: former Gov. John Spellman, former Gov. Booth Gardner,  former Lt. Gov. John Cherberg, former Gov. Al Rosellini. Photo courtesy of Washington State Archives.) Booth Gardner, Washington’s 19th governor who later led a successful statewide initiative to legalize assisted suicide for the terminally ill, died at his Tacoma home Friday night at age 76 from complications of Parkinson’s disease. Gardner became one of Washington’s more popular and charismatic governors. Gardner, a Democrat, was elected as the state’s top…

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From Archives: Our governors `do solemnly swear’

From Archives: Our governors `do solemnly swear’

If you’ve watched a governor or other statewide elected official being sworn in during the first week of a legislative session, you’ve noticed that the Supreme Court justice reads the oath as he or she swears in that official, and then both of them sign that document.  Then it’s on to the next official and justice, and so on. But what happens to the oath of office documents afterward? They eventually wind up with the State Archives for safekeeping. In…

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