Archives West Finding Aid

Wendell William Wyatt was born in Eugene, Oregon, in 1917, and moved to Portland, Oregon, as a teenager. He studied at the University of Oregon, but dropped out and worked at the Oregonian newspaper as a copy aide. He later applied and was admitted to the University of Oregon Law School, despite lacking an undergraduate degree. After receiving his law degree, Wyatt worked as an FBI agent, and then served as a Marine Corps pilot in the Pacific theater during World War II. After the war, Wyatt moved to Astoria, Oregon, and worked at the law firm of Albin Norblad, a former governor of Oregon and the father of U.S. Representative Walter Norblad.

Wyatt's political career began when he served on the Oregon State Republican Central Committee from 1955 to 1957. In 1964, after Walter Norblad died, Wyatt was elected U.S. representative to fill Norblad's vacancy. As a representative, he was a member of the House Committee on the Interior, and then a member of the House Appropriations Committee. In the latter role, he worked on legislation that established the Tualatin Reclamation Project in Washington County; a shipping channel in the Columbia River from Astoria to Portland; the Cascade Head Scenic Area in Lincoln City, Oregon; and the purchase of ranchlands along the Snake River for public recreation. Wyatt retired from Congress in 1975, but remained active in Republican politics. After serving in Congress, he worked at the law firm Schwabe, Williamson & Wyatt, served as a commissioner for the Port of Portland, and worked as a lobbyist.

Wyatt married Anne Elizabeth Buchanan (1920-2000) in the early 1940s. The couple had three children: Ann, Jane, and Wendell "Bill" Jr. The couple later divorced, and in 1962, Wyatt remarried to Faye Hill (1917-2007). Wyatt died in 2009.

Sources: Obituary in the Oregonian, January 29, 2009; "Wyatt, Wendell, 1917-2009," Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, https://bioguide.congress.gov/search/bio/W000778; vital and census records on Ancestry.com.

In 1965, Donna Kemp (later Donna Brown), a student at Willamette University in Salem, Oregon, participated in the Washington Semester Program sponsored by American University. During her time in Washington, D.C., she interviewed U.S. Representative Wendell Wyatt, his staff, his wife, and his colleagues, and attended some of Wyatt's committee meetings. She used this as a basis for a paper, "Wendell Wyatt of Oregon: A Case Study in the Orientation of a Freshman Congressman."

Source: Information supplied by Donna Brown in 2024.