Retired Shoreline schools Superintendent Bill Stevenson dies

After the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in December 1941, Bill Stevenson wanted to drop out of school and enlist in the military, like so many of his classmates. But a teacher at Bellevue High School persuaded him to get his diploma and start college before going off to war.

By postponing his enlistment, Mr. Stevenson ended up as the leading man in an epic love story that spanned six decades. The decision also helped solidify his passion for public education because he believed an educated public, capable of making informed decisions, was key to democracy.

A Marine who later became a teacher and a principal, Mr. Stevenson was superintendent of the Shoreline School District for 20 years before his retirement in 1982. He was later elected to two, six-year terms on the Washington State Board of Education.

After a brief battle with stomach cancer, Mr. Stevenson died at his Shoreline home Thursday (July 9), almost eight months after his wife of 62 years, Betty Jean, died of congestive heart failure. He was 85.

"He was always into self-empowerment," said Mr. Stevenson's son, Rick Stevenson, of Richmond Beach. "He believed the best way to protect children was to educate them, not shelter them, because that way they developed their own tools to negotiate life."

William George Stevenson was born Feb. 22, 1924, in Bellevue, the eldest of three children born to Harry and Charlotte Stevenson.

While "all his buddies were running off and joining the Army" after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Mr. Stevenson stayed in school, graduating from Bellevue High in 1942, his son said. That fall, he attended Washington State University in Pullman and sat beside his future wife in an introductory literature class.

"One day, he got called up and he just left" the university before a courtship could even begin, Rick Stevenson said.

Months later, Mr. Stevenson saw Betty Jean Wood on a bus in San Francisco, but it was so crowded they could only smile and wave to each other. Though Mr. Stevenson didn't know it at the time, Betty Jean had also enlisted with the Marines — and the two met again at a Halloween dance in 1943.

"That's when their fates were sealed," their son said. "It was such a huge love story set against an epic background. They found each other and remained true until he returned."

Soon after the dance, Mr. Stevenson — by then a Marine master sergeant — shipped out to the South Pacific, returning to California's Camp Pendleton after the Japanese surrendered in August 1945. He married Betty Jean on April 20, 1946.

After the war, the couple returned to WSU, graduating with teaching degrees. They earned their master's degrees in education from San Jose State University and both got teaching jobs with the Shoreline School District in 1950, Rick Stevenson said.

Mr. Stevenson later earned his doctoral degree in education from Columbia University in New York.

Mr. Stevenson became superintendent of the Shoreline district in 1962. A tender father who never yelled at his own children, he was shy and gentle, his son said. In his professional life, he was respected for his fairness and his ability to listen to people, Rick Stevenson said.

Craig Degginger, a school district spokesman, wrote in an e-mail that Mr. Stevenson "may be best remembered for his leadership following a double-levy failure in 1971, when the district lost more than 20 percent of its funding.

Mr. Stevenson, "backed by the school board, closed six schools and reduced staff by more than 25 percent to help make up the gap," Degginger wrote.

"A year later, a new levy was passed and the district began to rebuild its programs. (He) and the school board were honored by the Washington State School Directors Association as its School Board of the Year in 1972 for its handling of the financial crisis."

After he retired, Mr. Stevenson led a team effort to write "Shore to Shore, Line to Line," a 2007 book about the Shoreline School District's history from 1944 to 2004.

When Betty Jean Stevenson's health started deteriorating in 2004, her husband became her primary caregiver. In the four years before she died, Mr. Stevenson rarely left her side, Rick Stevenson said. He was diagnosed with cancer 10 days after she died in November 2008.

A memorial service for Mr. Stevenson will be Wednesday, July 29, at 1 p.m. at University Presbyterian Church, 4540 15th Ave. N.E., Seattle.

In addition to his son, Mr. Stevenson is survived by sister Marilyn Carlton, of Bellevue; brother Robert Stevenson, of Indianola, Kitsap County; daughter Jody Thornton, of Vancouver, Wash.; and four grandchildren.

Sara Jean Green: 206-515-5654 or sgreen@seattletimes.com