John Boitano, football coach at Garfield High

By Kyung M. Song
Seattle Times staff reporter

	John Boitano
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John Boitano was a gregarious and pugnacious Italian-American with thick, black hair and blue eyes who nonetheless lived his entire 81 years amid the Scandinavian reserve of Ballard.

He was a winning football coach at Seattle's Garfield High School who later lost his wife to Parkinson's disease and his left arm to skin cancer.

He was a man whose life and reputation were defined by athletics yet who pursued many other passions: raising horses, catching smelt, building concrete patios and driveways and bottling his own Zinfandel.

Mr. Boitano, assistant athletic director for Seattle Public Schools from 1968 to 1980, died of congestive heart failure March 6 at the University of Washington Medical Center.

He was born Nov. 13, 1922, to poor immigrants from Genoa, Italy. His father, Giovanni Stefano Boitano, was so eager to assimilate that he changed his name to John Steven Boitano. When Ballard began municipal trash collection during the 1920s, he became its first garbage man.

His son displayed his athletic prowess early. Mr. Boitano, who stood an inch short of 6 feet, was a star fullback and running back on Ballard High School's football team, ran track and played basketball. Still, Mr. Boitano's parents didn't imagine that he'd carve a stellar career in sports.

"Grandpa thought (sports) was a waste of time," said the deceased's son, also named John Boitano, head football coach at Arlington High School.

Mr. Boitano coached Garfield's football team from 1957 to 1968. He also coached the baseball team. Garfield's football team was voted No. 1 by the Associated Press state poll in 1957 and 1959, which then was tantamount to winning the state championship.

Bill Diambri, Mr. Boitano's assistant coach at Garfield, recalled his boss as a charismatic and popular coach who kept things lively by mixing up different plays at every game.

"He was a taskmaster, but he was a fun taskmaster," Diambri said of his friend of nearly 50 years. "We are really going to miss this man."
 
The younger John Boitano, who played football at Garfield under his father in 1967 and 1968, said his father was from the old school that dispensed corporal punishment with a paddle to keep players in line.

"He could be pretty danged disciplined. When he told you to do something, you wanted to do it," he said. Those who didn't, "they got a swat."

Mr. Boitano retired from teaching and coaching in 1980, after amassing a 77-22-6 record with the football team. In 1987, he ran for the North Seattle district seat on the Seattle School Board. He and two other challengers lost to the incumbent. John Boitano believes that some voters may have dismissed his father's coaching background as being one-dimensional.

"I think he kind of took it hard because he never ran again," he said.

Ill health plagued the last five years of Mr. Boitano's life, including heart problems. Three years ago, doctors amputated his left arm below the elbow because of cancer. But the cancer returned, forcing them to amputate the rest of the arm six months later. John Boitano said his father was an optimist by nature who was more angry than depressed about his health.

"He was the kind of guy that wanted to go full speed on things," he said.

Mr. Boitano was married for 55 years to his wife, Jane, who was of Norwegian descent. Jane Boitano died last year from Parkinson's. "He took care of her for a long time," the son said.

Mr. Boitano is also survived by his son Jay, of Issaquah, and daughter Sally Boitano-Gilbert of Salem, Ore.; daughter-in-law Carol Boitano of Arlington; sisters Lena Boitano of Seattle and Mazilia Ulacia of Bend, Ore.; four grandsons and one granddaughter.

Services will be held at 1 p.m. tomorrow at Ballard High School Auditorium, 1418 N.W. 56th St. Memorials may be sent to the Millionaire's Club, 2515 Western Ave., Seattle, WA 98121 or the University of Washington Medical Center's Regional Heart Center, 1959 N.E. Pacific St., Box 356422, Seattle, WA 98195-6422.

Kyung Song: 206-464-2423 or ksong@seattletimes.com

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