Lowell Mickelwait Served The Law, Boeing Co., Many Civic Groups

Lowell Mickelwait was a precise, serious man for whom clarity and honesty were daily companions.

"He was not a joker. As an attorney he was the typical old-fashioned man who didn't like `and/or,' " recalled his son, J. Semmes Mickelwait. "He would say `it can't be both ways.' And he wanted us to know what was the right way."

An attorney who rose to partnership in one of the Northwest's renowned law firms, now Perkins Coie, and then to vice-presidency of The Boeing Co., Mr. Mickelwait died yesterday morning in the Parkshore Retirement Home of a heart attack. He was 90.

Mr. Mickelwait had just celebrated his birthday Wednesday with a family dinner at the Sorrento Hotel's Hunt Club, one of his favorite restaurants.

And he was, characteristically, well-prepared at the end. A five-page obituary in his own handwriting was neatly filed in his law-firm office.

Mr. Mickelwait grew up in southern Idaho, which left him with a lifelong disdain for that state's most famous crop.

"He didn't like potatoes much . . . he usually passed them by at dinner because he had had so many of them when he was young," said his son.

Mr. Mickelwait graduated cum laude from the University of Washington Law School in 1930 and immediately joined the law firm in which he eventually became a partner and then managing partner. He also served two years in the Air Force's judge advocate general's office, being discharged in 1945 as a major.

In 1962 he withdrew from the law firm to become vice-president for industrial and public relations of The Boeing Co., serving in that position for 10 years until he retired. During that same period Mr. Mickelwait also served on the board of directors of what is now Puget Power and what is now US West Communications.

Much of the raising of three children was left by Mr. Mickelwait to his wife, Alice, his son said. "In that regard, Dad was a follower. He would follow Mom's lead in raising us."

Mr. Mickelwait returned to a part-time law practice with his old firm in 1972 and traveled the world with his wife. Mrs. Mickelwait died last spring.

Golf and boating, along with travel, were loves of Mr. Mickelwait's.

He started out with a sailboat and moved up to a ChrisCraft, "but Dad didn't like the gasoline consumption so he got a steel-hulled boat with a diesel engine," said his son. "It wasn't very fast, but Dad liked the economy of it much better."

Mr. Mickelwait's civic involvements were many. He was an organizer of the United Good Neighbor Fund, now called United Way of King County, and twice served as its president. He also was chairman of the Seattle-King County 1976 Bicentennial Commission, the Pacific Science Center, the King County Design Commission, and of the board of managers of the Norman Archibald Charitable Foundation, and vice-president of Forward Thrust.

Survivors include his son, of Mount Vernon, and two daughters, Anne Nelson of Birmingham, Ala., and Christie Betz, also of Mount Vernon; eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

Services will be Wednesday at the Church of the Epiphany, 38th Avenue East and East Denny Way, with arrangements by Bonney-Watson Funeral Home.