Judge Raymond Royal, a down-to-earth leader
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In eight years on the bench in the 1950s and 1960s, former King County Superior Court Judge Raymond Royal enjoyed the courtroom give-and-take, sorting through legal issues - even campaigning for votes.
"He loved people and working with people," said Mary Lou Royal, his wife of 58 years. "What he didn't like was to have to sit on a pedestal above everybody and not say anything. He got tired of that."
It was typical of a man who spent his long life - nearly all of it within a few miles of where he grew up in Seattle's University District - tackling community projects and serving dozens of organizations. He died Thursday at 84 after a lengthy battle with Alzheimer's disease.
His life was closely inter-twined with North Seattle. He grew up a few blocks north of the University of Washington and was student-body president at Roosevelt High School in 1938. He attended UW for both his undergraduate degree and for law school and liked to point out he was in the only UW law-school class required to attend for four years. (The university had briefly experimented with a four-year law program before returning to three years.)
After service in the Pacific during World War II, Judge Royal set up law practice in the Green Lake area but stayed active in the Naval Reserve, attaining the rank of commander and teaching international law at the Sand Point Naval Air Station. He also produced and moderated a local TV talk-show program, "World Law," from 1967 to 1970.
During the 1950s, civic leaders in North Seattle became increasingly concerned about the lack of a hospital north of the Ship Canal.
As president of the Northend Clubs of Seattle, Judge Royal helped raise money to acquire the land for what became Northwest Hospital, then served on the hospital's first board of trustees.
A lifelong Republican, he was elected to the King County Superior Court bench in 1957, serving two terms until he was defeated in 1965. He also ran unsuccessfully for the Legislature - an uphill battle in an increasingly Democratic Seattle.
Despite his many commitments, Judge Royal found time for his family. When his son, William, contracted polio at 5, he helped him rehabilitate his limbs every day before school and patiently helped him take up bike riding and skiing.
"He'd kind of coach me along and everything," William Royal recalled. "Some things I couldn't do, and he understood that."
Another great lifetime love was Scouting.
As a boy, Judge Royal earned his Eagle Scout badge, and his family scraped the money together to attend the 1933 Boy Scout World Jamboree in Budapest, Hungary. Some 54 years later, Judge Royal accompanied his grandson to the World Jamboree in Sydney, Australia - wearing his half-century-old Scout uniform, which still fit him.
"Everybody converged on them,'' Mary Lou Royal recalled. "They oohed and aahed over that uniform."
In addition to his wife, he is survived by his daughter, Pat Royal Hamilton of Eugene; sons Robert of Yakima, Richard of Phoenix and William of Bellingham; 14 grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.
A military gravesite service will be 10 a.m. Saturday at Mt. Pleasant Cemetery on Queen Anne Hill, followed by a memorial service at 2 p.m. at University Methodist Temple. Memorial contributions may be made to the Alzheimer's Foundation of Western and Central Washington or the Lions Club Sight and Hearing Foundation.