Résumé

Practiced law, Grafton, ND, 1898-1900.

Solo law practice, Seattle, WA, 1900-1904.

Partner in legal practice, Douglas, Lane and Douglas, with W.D. Lane and J.H. Douglas.

Secretary, Metropolitan Building Company, Seattle, WA, 1907-1920s.

Organizer, Waldorf Building Company, which erected the Waldorf Hotel, Seattle, WA, in 1905; Douglas also became Manager of the Metropolitan Building Company in 1912.

Trustee, Seattle Chamber of Commerce, Seattle, WA, 1906-c. 1916; Vice-president, Seattle Chamber of Commerce, 1911-1912; President, Seattle Carnival Association, 1911;

B.A. University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND, 1896; coursework, University of Minnesota, Saint Paul, MN; Bachelor of Laws, Yale University, New Haven, CT, 1898.

Douglas was born in Goodwood, ON, Canada, and came to the US as a child. He spent some of his childhood in ND and attended college in Grand Forks, ND from c. 1892-1896. He lived in Saint Paul, MN, attended classes at the University of MN, c. 1896, and lived in New Haven, CT, while matriculating at the Yale University Law School, c. 1897-1898. On 06/04/1900, he lived at 83 Cooper Avenue in Grafton, ND, according to the US Census of that year, but known to have moved to Seattle, WA, later in 1900. The 1930 US Census listed him living at 2309 11th Avenue North in Seattle; he lived there with his wife and children.

His parents were James Aaron and Annie Scott Douglas, both natives of County Tyrone, Ireland. Some of his childhood was spent in ND, acting as a developer and a politician.

Douglas married Neva Bostwick (born 12/1896 in IA), on 12/28/1898, in Bathgate, ND; J.F. met her at the University of North Dakota, where she was also in the class of 1896. Her parents were Sylvester D. and Mary Bostwick, both from IL.

J.F. and Neva had three children, John Francis, Jr., Neva Bostwick and James Bostwick Douglas, all born in WA.

Friends called him either "Frank" or "Major." Member, First Presbyterian Church of Seattle, Seattle, WA; he was Republican. Clarence Bagley wrote of him in 1916: "He has membership in the various Masonic bodies and in Nile Temple of the Mystic Shrine, while in club circles he is a prominent figure, belonging to the Rainier, the Seattle Golf, the Earlington Golf and Country, the Seattle Athletic, the Arctic, the Metropolitan, the Yale and the Seattle Advertising Clubs. He is a dynamic force in any movement with which he is associated and his enthusiastic support of a measure is contagious." (Clarence Bagley, History of Seattle from the Earliest Settlement to the Present Time, Volume III, [Chicago, The S.J. Clarke Publishing Company, 1916], p. 460-461.)

• Goodwood, ON Canada (Architect's Birth)
  Goodwood, ON Canada

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