Helen Hardin Jackson

Helen Hardin Jackson, 84, of Everett, WA, widow of U.S. Sen. Henry M. Jackson and mother of Anna Marie and Peter, died of Alzheimer's disease on February 24, 2018, surrounded by her family. A memorial service will be held on Saturday, March 24, 2018, at 2:00 p.m. at Everett's First Presbyterian Church, 2936 Rockefeller Ave. Helen Hardin was born in Clovis, New Mexico, on August 17, 1933, the only child of Jeanne Campbell Hardin and Marion Moody Hardin. After graduating from Highland High School in Albuquerque, Helen studied for a year at Vassar College, where she developed an appetite for English muffins and an aversion to East Coast pretentions. She later transferred to Scripps College in Claremont, California, was elected senior class president, and graduated with a degree in English and philosophy in 1955. She earned a master's degree in English literature, specializing in Virginia Woolf, from Columbia University in 1958. While there, she studied under Mark Van Doren, the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and critic. After life in New York, Helen opted to start anew, landing a job with New Mexico Sen. Clinton Anderson in Washington, D.C. It was there, in a senate elevator on her first day on the job, that she was introduced to Sen. Henry "Scoop" Jackson. They wed on December 16, 1961, at the Central Methodist Church in Albuquerque. She and Scoop had two children, Anna Marie in 1963 and Peter in 1966. In 1967, they moved into their house on Grand Avenue in Everett, WA, where Helen continued to reside until her death. For more than two decades, Helen invigorated Scoop's public life, providing grace, humor, and verve, softening Scoop's earnest, Norse-driven sobriety. She happily served as hostess, ambassador, loyal com-panion, and campaigner extraordinaire, playing an indispensable role in Scoop's 1972 and 1976 presidential campaigns. The political sphere kindled Helen's passion for human rights. In 1978, she and Joanne Kemp co-founded Congressional Wives for Soviet Jewry, which worked with ad-vocates and other political spouses from around the globe to ease restrictions on Soviet Jewish emigration. After Scoop's unexpected death in 1983, Helen moved home permanently and used the money left over from the senator's 1982 re-election campaign to establish and underwrite the Henry M. Jackson Foundation. In 2008, the foundation endowed the Helen H. Jackson Chair in Human Rights at the University of Washington's Jackson School of International Studies. The endowed chair generated the necessary momentum to create a permanent home for the study of human rights at the UW. In addition to chairing the Jackson Foundation, Helen was actively involved in dozens of civic and charitable organizations, including the Gertrude Jackson Memorial Scholarship Fund, the National Osteoporosis Foundation, the Pacific Northwest Ballet, the General Hospital Foundation, the American Red Cross, Imagine Children's Museum, the Little Red Schoolhouse, Snohomish County Democrats, and the Everett Women's Book Club. Helen's greatest love and dedication were to her children and her grandchildren. She adored them, and they her. She is survived by her daughter, Anna Marie, and her husband, Dan Laurence of Seattle; and son, Peter Jackson and his wife, Laurie Werner, also of Seattle; her grandchildren, Jack and Julia Laurence, and countless cousins, friends, and loved ones. The family asks that, in lieu of flowers, memorial donations be made to the Helen H. Jackson Chair in Human Rights at the UW, via the web at: giving.uw.edu/helenjackson; or to the Helen Jackson Scholarship at the Everett Rotary Youth Foundation, vis. The Rotary Club of Everett, P.O. Box 1225, Everett, WA 98206.