WATSON, William Arthur (1903-1977), of Belleville, Ontario, was born there on 31 December 1903 and came to Toronto in 1918 where he attended Malvern Collegiate and enrolled in the School of Architecture at the University of Toronto in 1923. He graduated in 1927 and after working for several Toronto architects including J.P. Hynes, Marani & Paisley, W.L. Somerville and S.B. Coon & Son, he returned to the University in 1931 to obtain a master's degree in Architecture. He was influenced by the academic teaching of Prof. Eric Arthur, who had arrived in Toronto in 1924, and it was Arthur who awarded Watson the Second Premium for his design for the North West Entrance to the City of Hamilton in 1928 (R.A.I.C. Journal, v, April 1928, 137, 141-44, illus. & descrip.). Watson returned to Belleville in 1933 and continued to practise there until his retirement in 1959. In 1938-39 he was hired as consulting architect on the design of a significant Art Deco residence for Joseph R. Rashotte at Tweed, Ontario. This landmark still stands on Victoria Street South in Tweed as of 2017. In 1942 he designed the office and factory for Deacon Brothers Ltd., Belleville, Ont. in a modernist style. He was nominated as a Fellow of the R.A.I.C. in 1957, and died at Oak Lake, Ont. on 8 July 1977 (obituary in The Intelligencer [Belleville], 12 July 1977; inf. Ontario Association of Architects).
TWEED, ONT., residence for Joseph R. Rashotte, Victoria Street South, 1938-39; still standing in 2017 (Tim Morawetz, Art Deco Architecture Across Canada, 2017, 167, illus. & descrip.)
BELLEVILLE, ONT., Deacon Brothers Ltd., office and factory, 1942 (R.A.I.C. Journal, xix, Oct. 1942, 204, illus.)
BELLEVILLE, ONT., large addition to weaving mill for J. & J. Cash Ltd., 1947 (Financial Post (Toronto), 21 June 1947, 15)