Harriet Bullitt

Bullitt founded Seattle Magazine, two radio stations and ran KING-TV for a brief time. She also helped the Bullitt Foundation allocate more than $200 million toward environmental causes. Harriet's mother, Dorothy, was a broadcasting pioneer in the northwest. Dorothy founded KING Broadcasting in the late 1940s. Harriet Overton Bullitt was born on September 10, 1924 in Seattle General Hospital, the first member of her family to be born in a hospital. Her grandfather, C.D. Stimson, was the owner of Seattle’s largest sawmill, a major owner of the Metropolitan Building Corporation, which built the Fairmont Olympic Hotel along with many other buildings in central Seattle, and was a co-founder of The Highlands. When her father died in 1932, Dorothy not only had to raise three children but also run the family business, Stimson Realty Company. Harriet studied chemical engineering at the University of Washington but moved east to Bennington College to finish her degree. She eventually earned a Zoology degree from UW, but not until 1965. At Bennington, Harriet met and married William Brewster, a handsome Dartmouth graduate. the couple moved to Gainesville, FL to work at the University of Florida. Working as a protein chemist, Harriet milked the venom from poisonous snakes to produce antivenom. In 1962, Harriet divorced Bill and moved back to Seattle with her children Wenda and Scott,. She married three more times, including her current husband Alex Voronin, who she met during a flamenco dancing party. She was well known for her leadership at the Bullitt Foundation – which was founded by her mother Dorothy and funded by Harriet with her sister Patsy and her brother Stim.