Arthur Francis Gollofon Jr., b. Seattle, WA, August 1930, d. Woodinville, WA, April 2023.
Born to a movie salesman and a Frederick & Nelson lace model, Art Gollofon Jr. grew up on Magnolia Bluff. As a child, he watched the U.S. Army exercising mules and horses on the dirt road that was Magnolia Boulevard, and he witnessed the WPA’s construction of streets, sewers and sidewalks.
Art attended Magnolia Grade School, then Queen Anne High, using the Seattle trolleybus system to get up Queen Anne Hill. He was a guard on the Queen Anne football team, and was enough of a bruiser to be selected to play for the All-Seattle team in the annual game against the All-State team.
When Art was in his last year at Queen Anne, a friend asked him if he’d like to be set up on a blind date with a Roosevelt High girl, Jackie Swanberg. Art wanted to see the girl first, so his friend surreptitiously pointed out Jackie at a Queen Anne/Roosevelt basketball game. Art approved, and the not-so-blind date was set up for Valentine’s Day. But when Jackie’s door opened, Art was confronted with a different girl from the one he thought had been pointed out to him…it turned out to be a pleasant surprise, and Art and Jackie were valentines for the next 75 years.
The University of Washington was the next stop in Art’s education. He played freshman Husky football, participated in the Naval ROTC Program, made lifelong friends in his Phi Gamma Delta fraternity, and went to all the Fiji dances with his valentine Jackie, who was also at the UW. Art and Jackie graduated from the UW in June 1952, and they were married that same month. Art then served as a Supply Department Division Officer at Whidbey Island Naval Air Station, where Jackie gave birth to the first of the couple’s three children. Released in 1954 from active duty, Art would continue to serve in the Active Reserve, retiring from the Navy as a commander in 1975.
Art’s UW degree was in business/transportation, and in 1954 he took a job at Boeing. After a short stint in the Boeing Traffic Department, he worked in Contracts, initially handling Boeing’s Air Force contracts, including one for the presidential 707. He negotiated the FAA-sponsored contracts to determine the feasibility of a Boeing SST. He was instrumental in Boeing’s decision to develop an Air Force cargo plane into the aircraft that became the 747, and he administered the contracts for the 747’s first customer, Pan Am. Art’s psychological warfare during Boeing/Pan Am negotiations is commented on in Wide-Body: The Triumph of the 747 by Clive Irving.
In 1969, Art delivered the first 747 to Pan Am, and after this milestone he oversaw Boeing contracts with all US airlines. In the next stages of his career, he negotiated commercial jet design and delivery with customers in the Mediterranean and the Far East. He was in Yugoslavia meeting with Tito’s government on the precarious day that Tito died. In the Kingdom of Nepal, his patience was stretched when negotiations were frequently interrupted by public holidays, but he was honored to be invited to the goat sacrifice to generally bless the Nepali jet upon its arrival. Art’s Beijing customers let him know that his surname translates to “foreign devil,” but the foreign devil especially enjoyed doing business with China. Toward the end of his career, Art handled Boeing’s most challenging contract problems wherever they occurred.
In 1992, Art retired from his job as Director, Aircraft Contracts to enjoy more time with Jackie, who’d retired from teaching elementary school in Woodinville. Art and Jackie had moved to Woodinville in the late fifties to raise their children, and they designed and built their final home there. While Jackie was still teaching, the couple shared the crazy responsibility of organizing the Woodinville Junior Rodeo, a popular event that raised PTA funds.
Because he traveled to exotic places for work, Art’s chosen family vacations involved Northwest camping, which meant hiking and canoeing to places where there were no other people. He was an all-around outdoorsman, a bird hunter as well as a fisherman. He particularly enjoyed fly fishing at Surrey Lake in Canada, because on the annual Surrey Lake vacations he was fishing with family and friends. Family was of paramount importance to Art. He set up an education fund for his grandchildren, and had new cabins built on his parents’ Skagit River property for use by his growing extended family. The “Rocky River Ranch” on the Skagit had been Art’s base for fishing and horse-camping in the Cascade foothills since his teens, and he was never happier than when his family and friends were enjoying it too.
Art was analytical and outspoken, but funny and witty, and often charming. He was an exasperatingly responsible man who nevertheless hooked up a homemade, shifty toboggan to his jeep so he could pull his kids and their friends around the neighborhood in the snow. He was always reading a nonfiction work, or a spy or mystery novel. He accompanied himself on his guitar as he sang “Five Foot Two, Eyes of Blue” and other popular classics for the people in his life. He liked to say “I’m seldom right but never in doubt” (he thought he was right, clearly), was madly in love with his wife all his life, was adored by his string of hunting dogs, and was the bane of car salespeople. Whether he was negotiating a business deal or helping a young person catch their first fish, Art operated as if he were Atlas holding up the world, and he was happy with his life, and was always himself.
Art was beloved by his family, and leaves them with indelible memories; he will be mourned to the bone by Jackie, his wife of more than 70 years. He is preceded in death by father Arthur Francis Gollofon Sr., mother Gladness Pugh Gollofon, brother Gary. Survived by wife Jacqueline; daughters Susan Meyers and Sandra, son A.J. (Janet); grandchildren Elizabeth Brumfield (Darren), Melissa Bryant (Sarah), Kristin Marhanka (Anthony); great-grandchildren Alexandra and Calvin Brumfield, Jack Marhanka. Among those who will smile, remembering him: fishing partners, and friends from Supper Club, Queen Anne, the Fijis, Doo-Dah, and Jackie’s quilting group.
The family thanks Art’s Companion Care caregivers, especially Hannah and Alla, and EvergreenHealth Hospice staff, for helping to make it possible to grant Art’s wish to remain in the home that he loved.
The post first appeared on Barton Family Funeral Service.