Donald Stuart McDowall, Sr.
Don was born and raised in a log cabin in the Canadian Rockies just north of Glacier National Park, in Alberta. His childhood was the difficulties of the Great Depression and then the struggle of World War II, which for Canada began in 1939.
His mother, Lenora, had U.S. citizenship, so in 1942 they moved to Northern California, where Don and his older brother Harry had some pretty idyllic teenage years fishing the creeks in the shadow of Mt. Shasta, hustling kids at marbles, aggravating apple growers and reveling in the much-milder winters.
Just as Don was graduating from Shasta Union High School in Redding (he got his diploma by mail) the family moved north — where the waters of the new Columbia Basin Reclamation Project had reached Moses Lake. He and Harry hustled the pinball machine at Mom’s Cafe (owner: their mom) and then Don got drafted into the U.S. Army — but the Korean War ended while he was in Basic Training.
So it was 1953, and Don was selected to help integrate the formerly all-black 520th Transportation Company in Northern France. He said he never stopped laughing during his 16 months with “the brothers.” He was also the company commander’s training assistant, researching and prepping demonstrations and was recommended for Officer Candidate School.
He took an Honorable Discharge (remaining in the Army Reserve until 1961), came back to a booming Moses Lake, and caught on with the Snyder carpentry family, over from Seattle to build houses. Don’s brother, Bob, had a buddy named Al Cordell, and Al had a little sister who lived down Stratford Road from Don’s parents’ dairy.
Marvin Snyder was Don’s best man when he married Barbara Cordell in 1956. When Larson Airbase was closing in 1960, Don and Barb headed over to the coast to work with Marvin and make enough money to come back and buy a farm.
By 1963, Don had his own framing contractor operation and rode the Seattle building boom in the '60s. At one point, he designed, had blueprinted and built his own “mid-century modern” home for Barb and the three “rugrats” they were hauling over the mountains back to Moses Lake every holiday to see their grandparents and cousins.
In 1970, Seattle’s boom was over, and Don’s arm was done banging boards. They sold the house and bought a 280-acre farm south of George. It wasn’t Hog Heaven just because Don was raising feeder pigs, hay and grain; he was back in the Basin with his family close and his kids learning the values of farm life.
This was a single-handed operation, though, and after three seasons, Don knew enough about business to realize that three kids weren’t going to college on what the farm was making. So he sold the place for twice what he paid and started a new chapter — in real estate.
When Ken Graves stood by the fence talking to Don about selling his farm, Don talked to Ken about becoming a salesman. He took classes and by 1975 was an associate broker with Graves Realty in Ephrata, specializing in farm and commercial properties. In 1979, he became president of the Moses Lake-Othello Board of Realtors.
That career continued into the 1980s with Don becoming a part-time instructor in real estate at Big Bend Community College. While he was at the college, he obtained an Associate in Applied Science degree, a lifetime goal of Don’s.
Real estate professionals got to know people at the Courthouse, because that’s where information on property valuations, boundaries, tax levies, and such was kept. County Assessor Rose Freestone convinced Don to join her staff so she could retire, and a few years later, in 1986, Don was elected to take over officially as Grant County Assessor.
He was very honored to serve the people of Grant County, and with Treasurer Darryl Pheasant (also elected with Don) fostered the transformation of county property and tax information onto computers and eventually something called “the internet.”
Don’s other major achievement for the county was obtaining reimbursement from the US Government for land taken to create the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. It was a seven-year project highlighted by two days alone in a room with DOJ lawyers trying to catch him filing a “fraudulent claim.” They failed, and the Mattawa School District got a surprise seven-figure “donation” from the feds.
After 16 years as “Our Beloved Assessor,” Don retired, took up golf and worked on the 1950s Chevy pickups he was restoring with his grandson Trevor. He and his good friend Don Goodwin were regulars at Big Bend Community College basketball and volleyball games for many years.
He outlived his brother-in-law, Al, Marv Snyder, his brothers, Harry and Bob, Mr. Graves, Mr. Goodwin and Rose, too. Don gradually succumbed to the Parkinson’s Syndrome that had taken his mother. He’d seen how that went and tried to be as kind and helpful as he could to his caregivers — Barb and his daughter, Kelley, who made it possible for him to live out his life in his own home. Every night of his 69-year marriage, Don had his wife sleeping at his side.
He was also the Elder of the McDowall Clan in North America, so Don has a lot of survivors besides all of his family and friends here.
We’ll just list the immediate family which includes: Wife Barbara; Son Donald Stuart Jr. and his son Logan; Daughter Tomi, her husband, Tony Smith and their son, Trevor; Daughter Kelley, her husband, Tom Pearce, her daughter, Elizabeth Schmidt, and her daughter, Emily, Em’s husband, Jason Christensen, and their daughters, Grace and Mikayla; Brother-in-law Tom Cordell and his wife, Marcia; Sister-in-law Marilyn McDowall; Sister-in-law Mildred Cordell; and the last of Don's siblings, his sister, Marjorie Claiborne.
The family would like to thank Rachel, Holly and Yesie at Assured Hospice for their compassionate care toward the end of Don’s journey.
A gathering of friends and family was held Friday, Aug. 8, before Don was interred at Pioneer Memorial Gardens under the broad blue sky of the Columbia Basin that he proudly called home.
Please express your thoughts and memories for the family at https://bit.ly/DSMcDOWALL. Arrangements are under the care of Kayser's Chapel of Memories.
