In the boomtown period after World War II, James Bostwick Douglas shaped much of Seattle's landscape, from launching Northgate Mall in the '50s to creating an annual city fete called Seafair, to helping build the Space Needle.

He did with his hands and brain what he couldn't do with his legs. An influential businessman and civics leader, Douglas was born with polio. He used leg braces and later, a wheelchair.

"He said to me several times that the best thing that ever happened to him was polio. It made him do everything harder. It gave him a work ethic," said his cousin, C.R. Douglas, the host and producer of Seattle TV show "City Inside/Out."

Douglas died Wednesday. He was 95. Born in Seattle on Aug. 15, 1909, he was the son of John Douglas, a prominent downtown commercial builder. The younger Douglas followed in his father's footsteps, graduating from the University of Washington and attending Harvard Business School.

In 1950, he presided over the opening of the Northgate Shopping Mall, among the country's first shopping centers with stores facing a walkway instead of a road, an innovative concept at the time. Douglas and his employees lured shoppers with polar bear cubs, a Cadillac giveaway and a 212-foot-tall Christmas tree, chronicled as a world record in Life magazine, according to, an online encyclopedia of local history.

In 1952, he became chairman of the first United Way campaign in Seattle and presented another innovative idea: Ask employees and companies for a single donation for different charities, instead of each charity bombarding companies for money. Douglas raised more than $3.1 million that first year.

"He was hugely influential in the '50s and '60s," said Walt Crowley, executive director of Douglas also belonged to the organizing committee that launched Seafair, and later became its president.

But what he may be best known for is his work on the Space Needle. As vice president of construction on the 1962 World's Fair Commission, Douglas brought together investors, architects and builders to carry out his friend's napkin doodle of a lofty spire crowned with a "flying saucer" restaurant, his cousin said.

"He was incredibly charismatic and very, very gutsy and driven, and that's represented by his many accomplishments," C.R. Douglas said.

In his later years, Douglas became a generous philanthropist, donating $1 million to the UW Business School and nearly $1 million to Swedish Medical Center.

Douglas is survived by his sons, James Douglas and John Douglas, and three grandchildren.

A private memorial is scheduled for next week. Remembrances may be made to Swedish Medical Center, 747 Broadway, Seattle, WA 98122.