But Torrance, bags packed, caught a break days before his scheduled departure: World War I ended when Turkey, followed by Austria-Hungary, capitulated. The declaration of armistice not only ended the war, it set in motion one of the most amazing β maybe the most amazing β careers any Seattle man ever fashioned for himself.
When Torrance died, after having had a hand in the hiring of every football coach and every athletic director from Enoch Bagshaw through Jim Owens , the Don James era at Washington had just about spent itself. Without Sick, there would have been no Rainiers as Seattle fans knew them then, and as many boomers recall them fondly today.
Without the Rainiers, there would have been no Fred Hutchinson phenomenon see Wayback Machine: Hutch β A Man And An Award , since it was not only Torrance who signed the future icon, but Torrance who helped negotiate his sale to the Detroit Tigers in one of the biggest Seattle sports swaps in the first half of the 20th century.
Without Torrance, neither would have played their home games in a stadium that Torrance, as a newly minted UW graduate, helped fund.
Unlike most doers of large civic deeds, Torrance did not emerge from wealth, nor did he accumulate it. Torrance made his mark through sweat, spirit and simple force of personality. Roscoe Conkling Torrance, born Sept.
