Wes Broten, Outdoorsman, Watercolor Artist

When Wes Broten headed for the Olympic Peninsula for the weekend, his kit included a fishing rod, sketch pad, a can of beans and a blanket, says his widow, Ada Broten of Smokey Point, Snohomish County.

And when he returned from those weekend jaunts, Mrs. Broten said this week, he usually brought home both sketches and fish.

"He always kept a sketch pad in his car," she said, and if he was driving along and saw an old tree or some other scene he liked, he'd sketch it and then later put it in a painting.

Mr. Broten, 81, an avid outdoorsman and noted watercolor artist, died Nov. 21 after a long illness.

His watercolors were sold in a number of galleries in the Northwest, and were included in collections here and abroad. His painting of the waterfront in Coupeville is still being sold on cards in that Whidbey Island community. He was a member of the Northwest Watercolor Society.

Illness had kept Mr. Broten from painting for the past few years, and he contended with health problems most of his life.

Mr. Broten was born in Portland on June 27, 1911, and was reared in Seattle. He attended Greenwood Elementary School and graduated in 1928 from Ballard High School.

Eager to study fine arts, he attended the University of Washington while working at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. But the Depression intervened, and Mr. Broten moved to join his parents in Port Angeles, working at the Evening News.

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Mr. Broten immediately enlisted, serving several years with the Navy Seabees in the South Pacific.

He and the former Ada Stigenwalt married in 1946, after a three-month, post-war courtship.

Mr. Broten by then was balancing his passion for art with his need to make a living. He worked as a layout artist at a Seattle printing firm but, after becoming ill, decided to take an outdoor job at Lake Wenberg State Park near Stanwood.

He stayed there for 14 years, working hard at watercolors all the while. In 1966, after suffering a heart attack, he elected to pursue art full time. The Brotens moved to Camano Island where he painted, ran a small gallery and taught classes.

Soon he was selling enough paintings to make a living.

Besides his wife, survivors include a sister, Louise Gambill of Tacoma, and several nieces and nephews.

He was to be cremated and his ashes strewn in the Sauk River. Memorials may be made to the Parkinson Disease Association at the University of Washington Department of Neurology.