Famed watercolor painter remembered growing up in Pottsville

Sep. 2—Howard Noel Watson, a Pottsville native, rose to become a nationally recognized watercolorist, illustrator and teacher who lived much of his adult life in Philadelphia.

Watson was 93 when he died last year at Edgehill Nursing Rehabilitation Center in Glenside, Montgomery County.

Known for his trademark bright watercolors and impressionistic style, he was artist-in-residence — meaning he was the preferred artist — at the White House when Jimmy Carter was president. Carter gifted a Watson print to VIPs around the world.

In 1994, President Bill Clinton commissioned Watson to do a painting for Philippine President Fidel V. Ramos, a West Point graduate. In three days, Watson painted West Point's clock tower with cadets marching in front of it. Ramos is said to have wept when he saw it.

Watson also produced paintings for Vice President Walter Mondale, singer Perry Como and former Philadelphia Eagles player Tom Brookshier.

That said, Watson left an artistic legacy that includes paintings of his birth city.

One of his works, which is in the Schuylkill County Council For The Arts collection, depicts the former Yuengling Mansion on Mahantongo Street.

Another shows the first block of Mahantongo Street, including the Pottsville Republican offices, as it looked in the 1930s.

"He never lost sight of his birth city and county, and painted their landmarks and neighborhoods," a Watson biography on Wikipedia said.

"Bud" Watson was born in Pottsville in 1929, about five months before the stock market crash triggering the Great Depression.

At the time, the majority of African American families lived on Minersville Street, a segregated enclave between Laurel Street and the Schuylkill County Courthouse.

Known for its after-hours jazz clubs, Minersville Street remained segregated until the 1960s, when it was razed under the federal urban renewal program.

His father, James B. Watson, owned an engraving shop and did work for local newspapers. He also drew a cartoon, "Amos Hokum," for an African-American newspaper in Baltimore.

By junior high, young Howard showed signs of following in his father's footsteps. He was encouraged to develop his artistic talent by art teacher Isabel Zerbe.

After graduating from Pottsville High School in 1947, he attended Penn State's Pottsville campus, majoring in art and music. He played baseball and basketball and was president of the campus art club.

A Korean war veteran, he enrolled in the Tyler School of Art at Temple University. His watercolor won first prize at the Clothesline Exhibit at Rittenhouse Square, the oldest in the country, in 1959.

"I love the medium of watercolor more than any other, and I love the impressionists," Watson said in an interview. "My paintings are more like the impressions I get when I look at these sights, the shapes and forms that come into my mind's eye."

Watson was featured in a major exhibition of black artists, entitled "Afro American Artists: 1800-1969," at the Philadelphia Civic Center Museum. In 1988, his work was featured in "The Pride, The Prejudice," which explored black art, at the Philadelphia Free Library.

He published two books, "Philadelphia Watercolors" in 1971 and "Old Philadelphia Impressions" in 1975.

Through the U.S. State Department Art In Embassies program, his paintings hung in embassies in Africa and South America.

He taught art at the Philadelphia College of Art, and held watercolor workshops at Cape Cod and abroad in Switzerland, Scotland and France.

Throughout his career, Watson returned to Pottsville.

In 1988, he was the first person to receive the Pottsville High School Distinguished Alumnus Award.

Mary Beth Harvey, a Pottsville watercolor artist, was among about 10 artists to participate in a workshop conducted by Watson in the early 1990s.

He conducted classes on Sculps Hill, in Garfield Square and in Orwigsburg's town square.

"He was very fast, and he never made mistakes," recalled Harvey, this year's Allied Artists featured painter. "He was very down to earth, and very unassuming."

In 2002, Watson was the first artist to be inducted into the Schuylkill County Council For The Arts Hall of Fame.

"I am very honored to be honored," he said upon being inducted. "I think it's very special, especially coming from my hometown. Pottsville will always mean something to me."

(Staff writer Devlin can be reached at rdevlin@republicanherald.com)

Contact the writer: rdevlin@republicanherald.com; 570-628-6007