In this third part of the six-part Watson Chronicles series, the spotlight is on the early career of Dan Watson, the 10th and last photojournalist in the celebrated Watson Family dynasty, before he joined The Signal newspaper in Santa Clarita, California, in 1998.

The first part covered the news that Watson, a fourth-generation photojournalist, had decided to retire in June 2024, after logging nearly 20 years as the paper’s award-winning lensman.

In Part 2, we flashed back to profile Watson’s famous forebears, renowned as “Hollywood’s First Family,” whose colorful history, as noted in Part 1, stretches back to the 1880s — four generations of movie actors, horse wranglers, stuntmen, special effects producers, film studio innovators and inventors, news and commercial photographers, photojournalists, and newsreel-TV cameramen.

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Hollywood Dynasty: Dan Watson is the last of 10 photographers spanning four generations of the Watsons, the “First Family of Hollywood.” Top row (from left): James, Coy Sr., and George. Bottom row: Dan, Coy Jr., Harry, Bill, Delmar, Garry, and Bobs. Photo illustration: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Archive.

Daniel West Watson was born to singer/actor/photographer Garry Watson and his wife Jackie in Los Angeles, California, on March 15, 1957, with a camera in one hand and a flash unit in the other. As a Watson, the appendages came as standard equipment.

Growing up in a close-knit family of photographers, Dan felt either destined or doomed, or a little of both, to a career peering through a viewfinder.

While a couple of his first cousins dabbled in photography, they eventually pursued other careers. Dan alone represents the fourth and last generation of Watson Family lensmen, and the last in the line of 10, following his great-grandfather James, grandfather Coy Sr., great-uncle George, uncles Coy Jr., Harry, Bill, Delmar, and Bobs, and Garry, Dan’s father.

“It’s something to be a fourth-generation photographer in this family,” Dan told former Signal colleague Carol Rock in April 1999. “I grew up hearing my uncles talking about all the exciting things they got to do, and it sounded like the right thing to get into. I fit right into the slot they left open.”

“We’d go to a family Christmas or any event like that,” Dan told Rock, “and all the brothers would be there talking about news stories they’d done: ‘Oh, I just shot this, shot that.’ And they’d laugh. They were actors who became photographers and knew how to deal with people. I’d listen to these stories, and it sounded like so much fun. And I was good at it. I knew that’s what I wanted to do.”

Dan Watson refers to his Uncle Delmar Watson’s book of famous movie and news stills, “Quick, Watson, the Camera,” during an interview at SCVTV in Santa Clarita in June 2024. Photo: Stephen K. Peeples/Stephen K. Peeples Productions.

As essayist Helen R. Weiner observed in her foreword to the 1975 book “Quick, Watson, The Camera” by Dan’s Uncle Delmar Watson, editors at the L.A. papers were afraid to hire more than one Watson at a time because the brothers would cause too much mayhem.

“My dad always resented that reputation because he was very grounded in creative photography and doing the job,” Dan said of Garry.

“He didn’t like sports – all he loved was photography, and he was very creative,” he said. “Most fathers would say, ‘Come on, son, let’s go throw the baseball outside.’ My dad used to say, ‘Come on, Dan, I’ll show you how to load the Hasselblad.”

That suited the youngster just fine; Dan wasn’t into playing sports, either.

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First Camera: Kodak Brownie 127

The first camera Dan owned was a Kodak Brownie 127, a Christmas gift in 1962, when he was not yet six years old, he recalls.

“I still have some of those pictures,” he said. “They’re nothing spectacular. But my dad said, ‘Come on down. We’ll develop your pictures down at the office.’ He had an office then. That sparked me to think, ‘Oh, I know how to make this better. I can do this better.’ I had an artistic sense anyway, and he massaged that. He was always very creative. I could see what he was doing and had that spark in me, too.”

Boy photographer Daniel West Watson shows off his first camera, a Kodak Brownie 127, a Christmas gift in 1962. Photo: Garry Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

With his family’s connections, Dan could have easily also gone into acting as a youngster.

“My dad knew some people who produced ‘The Beverly Hillbillies’ and all those shows in the ’60s, and an agent wanted to sign me up,” he said. “I had a good look and was very (unself-conscious). Cameras didn’t… Nothing bothered me. But by then my mom and dad were divorced, and I was living with my mom, and it wouldn’t have worked out. I’m kind of glad it didn’t. It’s a weird business.”

Still, by observing the antics of his showbiz relatives as he grew up, Dan learned what (and what not) to do and how (and how not) to act as a professional photographer in ways he would never learn in a classroom.

All the Watson photographers since Dan’s great-uncle George were active members of the Photographers Association of Greater Los Angeles. Dan still is. He recalled how his uncles would ham it up at Press Club award shows for their peers.

“The press knew them all,” Dan said. “When they were the 6 Watson Brothers doing commercial photography, they did promotions for their business. So, think of six Vaudevillians doing promotions for their photography.”

All movie actors when they were kids in the 1920s-1940s, the 6 Watson Brothers also hammed it up as members of the L.A. Press Club during their vaudeville-inspired sketches. They were notorious for stunts like hitting honorees in the face with cream pies. No one’s ego or dignity was left intact, and the fans loved it. Photo: Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

One of the brothers’ Press Club stunts was building a human pyramid, cheerleader-style, and even got Dan involved at least once.

“Uncle Billy would be on top, waving an American flag,” he said. “My Uncle Bobs knew how to do all those explosions. One time, I took a picture of them doing the pyramid, then set off the explosion. They were all waving the flag and laughing. They were something else.”

The 6 Watson Brothers attempted a Guinness World Record for the biggest human pyramid at the L.A. Press Club in Hollywood on September 9, 1975. Their construct stood 12 feet tall, with a total age of 276 years and a weight of 1,100 pounds. The attempt broke no record, but cracked up the brothers’ Press Club peers. Bottom row: Bobs, Delmar, and Coy Jr. Middle: Garry and Harry. Top: Billy. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

On another occasion, September 9, 1975, at the L.A. Press Club in Hollywood, the brothers attempted to set a Guinness World Record for building the biggest human pyramid. Theirs was a six-person pyramid approximately 12 feet high with a combined weight of 1,110 pounds and total ages of 276 years. They were not even close to breaking a record, but the stunt broke up the Press Club audience nevertheless.

The L.A. Press Club’s Eight Ball Final magazine published a series of wacky Watson Brothers ads like this one in the 1950s and 1960s. Photo: Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

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Classroom Education, First Pro Assignments

In school, Dan wisely took advantage of photo courses to help further his skills, find fresh ideas outside the Watson hive, and even possibly make a buck or two.

Dan Watson got his first real experience in shooting sports and made his first buck while attending Luther Burbank Junior High School in the early 1970s. Photo: Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“At Luther Burbank Junior High in Burbank, I made my first money shooting football,” he said. “Fortunately, I had all the cameras and lenses, so I was very advanced that way. We did yearbook stuff, and if they wanted good pictures, they called me. So, I was very published in the yearbook. That was my start.”

Danny Watson poses with an exhibit of his news photographs during an open house at Luther Burbank Junior High School in Burbank, early 1970s. Photo: Garry Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

At John Burroughs High School in fall 1974, Dan naturally signed up for the elective Photo Department courses. Not surprisingly, his skills and experience put him at or near the top of his class.

On a visit to San Juan Capistrano in 1974, Dan Watson photographed a toddler looking up at him with an inquisitive expression. This image won a Kodak Scholastic Photography Award, and was one of 44 exhibited at the Kodak Photo Gallery in New York later the same year. The photo also toured the country as part of a Kodak exhibit of high school photography. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Dan got on well with his photo teacher at Burroughs, Tim Brehm, who quickly recognized his student’s advanced skills.

“‘Dan, I don’t know what I could teach you,’ he said. But I wanted to hear somebody else tell me how to do things. I’d heard my family, and I’d done a lot of things myself, but I’d only heard one way.”

John Burroughs High School photography teacher Tim Brehm (center) and senior photographers Mike Funk (left) and Bill Livingston pose for a photo after winning photo contest awards in 1975. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Beyond family and school, Dan found inspiration by reading a lot.

“I don’t think I ever followed specific photographers, but I’d look at magazines and look at their work,” he said. “That’s when I was in high school and excited. (Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist) Brian Lanker was shooting rodeo. I always wanted to shoot rodeo, and don’t think I ever did. He was really good with creative lighting.”

Intro to Community News

In his senior year, Dan took on the special assignment that introduced him to community news photography.

“They needed somebody to shoot for a special publication called ‘Our Public Schools’ in the Burbank Daily Review,” he said, referring to a neighborhood paper.

Daniel West Watson shot all the images for a special section titled “Our Public Schools – America’s Future” printed by the independent Burbank Daily Review for National Public Schools Week in 1976. Photo: Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I had to drive to 20 different schools and shoot creative pictures. Nothing constrained me. My photo teacher said, ‘Just go and do it,’ and I did. I’d seen my dad do it, so it was just natural. There was nothing to it. It was printed as a special section. A lot of copies were produced by this small community newspaper, like The Signal.”

Covering sports events at Burroughs High in the mid-1970s included shooting the cheerleaders, too, as Dan Watson did in 1975. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

In spring 1976, Burroughs honored the graduating senior with an award as the school’s most-published photographer of the year, the first of Dan’s untold number of accolades.

In 1975, when singer-songwriter-actor Mac Davis shot an episode of his TV show at Burbank’s John Burroughs High School, and Heisman Trophy winner O.J. Simpson was his guest, school photographer Dan Watson caught them in a moment between scenes. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

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He’s Off & Running at Hollywood Park

Dan Watson’s career as a pro shooter was off and running just out of high school when he landed a gig as an official track photographer at Hollywood Park. He was 18.

In summer 1976, George Andrus, the official photographer for night harness racing at Hollywood Park, hired Dan Watson to assist in shooting the finish and winner’s circle photos after each race. Photo: Garry Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“My uncles were great to me and supported me in every way they could,” Dan said. “My Uncle Harry was mainly a movie guy but had started in stills. He had an office in Burbank with another guy. Harry said to me, ‘Why don’t you come in? I’ve got a little office here. You can rent it from me for 60 bucks a month.’ I think their rent was $660. He said, ‘You pay the $60, you can have this small little office with a desk and a phone.’

When Dan Watson launched his solo photography business in after graduating high school in June 1976, he used his full name on business cards and shared office space in Burbank with his uncle Harry Watson. Dan shot this selfie to promote his new enterprise. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“Right next door was a photo supply place, owned by a guy named Dick Hotop,” Dan said. “I went there one day to buy something, and Dick said, ‘Hey, the photographer at Hollywood Park Harness Racing’s looking for somebody to help him out.’

“That was George Andrus, who like my uncle and me also bought his supplies from Hotop. Dick was a good friend, but he was very cheap, so he figured I’d work cheap for George.

“So, on racing nights, I had to drive from Burbank to Hollywood Park and shoot the harness races in the middle of the night down in Inglewood, which was thrilling,” Dan said, sarcastically.

Dan Watson shot his boss, George Andrus, at Hollywood Park in 1976. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“But it was natural for me. It was easy, like falling off a log. I also learned a lot from George Andrus. I learned his techniques, learned what he wanted me to do. And boom.

“It wasn’t creative at all. It was finish and winner’s circle. Horse going across the line, boom. Then the winner’s circle, they’d all come in, smile, look at the camera, boom. It was photography. George and I were friends for quite a while.”

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First Community News Job: Valley News and Green Sheet

Even with cheap office space at his Uncle Harry’s, Dan’s work at Hollywood Park and the odd freelance photo job still didn’t cover expenses by mid-1977.

“So, I was working at a drugstore, stocking shelves,” he said. “My dad came in there and said, ‘What the hell are you doing this for?’ He was working at the Valley News and Green Sheet in Van Nuys by then. He said, ‘Come on, I’ll get you on down there.’ My dad was a great news photographer, but he had five operations on his neck, so he was not there a lot. He said, ‘I’m going on vacation, you can fill in.’

“I remember the first day,” Dan said. “Again, it was just like falling off a log. I had to ride along with one of the guys so he could see if I knew how to write captions. After he took me along, he told the editor, ‘Yeah, he’s okay, just let him go.’

“I also worked in the lab for a while,” Dan said. “My dad was off and on with his operations, so I was covering for him there, too.”

Dan Watson cleans up in the Valley News and Green Sheet darkroom in 1977. Photographer unknown, courtesy Watson Family Photographic Collection.

But when it came to photo assignments, Dan didn’t have his uncle’s seniority, and said he took what he could get: “They had good sports photographers. They were older. And they’d look at the assignments: ‘Oh, I like this one.’ Whatever was left, I would take.

“I’ll never forget: I had to shoot a woman and her cabbage, a huge cabbage,” he said. “That was my assignment: ‘Dan, go out and take a picture of the cabbage with this woman.’

“My dad always taught me every assignment has something that you need to capture, and to ask yourself, ‘What can I do that’s different, that still tells the story?’ Because if a reporter could just go with their phone and shoot it like they can now, what’s the point?

In June 1977, Dan Watson picked up a super-challenging feature assignment from the Valley News and Green Sheet to photograph Mrs. George Lewis, who grew a 14-inch cabbage as president of the Southern California Garden Club in Van Nuys. Photo: Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“So, I got a ruler, and she’s holding the cabbage, and she’s doing okay. My dad taught me how to pose pictures that way. It was a great picture of what I call a mind-numbing assignment. Accolades came in from the editors because they were used to the photographers just going out and going bang, bang, bang.”

The upshot: “They finally wanted to hire me,” Dan said.

He also got better assignments, like shooting stills for a feature spread about Daniel Lewis, conductor of the Pasadena Symphony Orchestra in 1978.

One of Daniel Watson’s early feature assignments for the Valley News and Green Sheet was shooting art for a story about Daniel Lewis, the Pasadena Symphony Orchestra’s conductor, in 1978. Courtesy Watson Family Photographic Collection.

Other memorable Valley News and Green Sheet assignments included taking photos for a holiday feature published on December 25, 1979, and a profile of comedian Geri Jewell for the January 17, 1980, edition of the VN$GS.

But then one day VN$GS management sent Dan a letter informing him the paper had a no-nepotism rule.

“I’m going, ‘What? Because in your features department, you’ve got a married couple working together!’” he said. “‘Well, they were already here.’ I still have the letter: ‘We’d love to hire you, but we can’t because your dad’s a valued employee here.’ It was annoying.”

Though not on the staff, Dan nonetheless fielded numerous assignments from the paper’s editors over the next few years, both filling in for his dad and as a first-call freelancer, all the while soaking up experience and adding to his expertise. What became a career-long affinity for community news came into focus at the Valley News and Green Sheet.

A Nikon-toting Daniel Watson heads into the night on assignment for the Valley News and Green Sheet in 1978. Photographer unknown, courtesy Watson Photographic Collection.

“There was a staff of 10 people,” he said. “I just can’t imagine having that many (as the head of a photo department). You’re with another guy, you say, ‘Oh, you got a new lens? Oh, wow, that’s the new…’ I remember when autofocus came out, and the first zoom lens for a telephoto lens. ‘Oh, my gosh, I wish I could afford that!’ I’m still using my camera from 1964!'” [laughter]

Valley News and Green Sheet photo chief Bob Halverson, left, and Garry Watson discuss new camera equipment at the paper’s Van Nuys office, 1980. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Photographic Collection.

“But that was the camaraderie – we all had the same mindset,” Dan said. “We were all trying to do a good job in still photography. That’s all we had to do. We didn’t have to write or shoot videos or anything else.”

Valley News and Green Sheet photographers (from left) Herb Carlton and Dan Watson  clown in the office in Van Nuys, as unamused colleague John Rosenfield throws them a side-eye, 1980. Photographer unknown, courtesy Watson Family Photographic Collection.

“I remember one guy in charge was quite a technician of all things,” he said. “He showed me new techniques. I always heard when you develop film, if you’re shooting something dark, you just keep developing. But all over-developing does is block up the highlights. It doesn’t do much to the shadows that you’re trying to increase. He said, ‘What you need to do is overexpose your picture and under-develop it, and then it flattens everything.’

“Those are things I would have learned in college or from someone else that I missed,” Dan said. “I love my family. They were all very good, but they were stuck in their own things, too.”

Though the Valley News and Green Sheet wouldn’t hire him, Dan landed a gig in 1980 shooting for the Glendale News-Press and Burbank Leader, another well-established community paper – but a chance encounter on personal time proved to be much more life-altering.

Photographer Chris Humphrey shot his colleague Dan Watson while they covered a brush fire for the Glendale News-Press in 1980. Photo: Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

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Dan Watson Loves Candy

“It was lonely,” Dan said about his life in 1980 as a single guy married to his work. “All I did was work and shoot. I wasn’t great with girls in high school. So, I said, ‘I want to do something creative.’ I took an art class and a music class at Valley College. I’m not a good typist. I’m not good at reading music. I had a ukulele. My dad taught me to play ukulele, which was fun. But I couldn’t read music. I just didn’t want to put in the effort.

“I took the art class, which was fun, and Candy was there,” he said. “She always reminds me there was another girl, real cute, short hair. I said, ‘Oh, I’d like to go after her. I’m going to chat her up.’ We went outside, and she was smoking, and I didn’t like that. Candy was out there, too, so she always says, ‘Oh, I was second choice.’ I said, ‘No, you were always my first choice.’

Art students Candy Stone and Dan Watson, 1980. Photo: Garry Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photographic Collection.

“Her last name was Stone,” Dan said. “She had beautiful red hair, strawberry blonde, she’d call it. That’s how we met. I bought her a cup of hot chocolate and made fun of her. She said, ‘Oh, it’s cold.’ I said, ‘Aren’t you a mountain girl? I thought you liked the mountains.’ So, from then on it developed.

“Our first date was funny,” he said. “From the art class, I had her phone number, and I called her up just as a phony call. I said, ‘You know, I didn’t get the art assignment last night. Do you have it?’ ‘Yes.’

“She worked at The Broadway department store. She was a hairdresser. All she knew about me was I was shooting pictures. I said, ‘Well, can we meet at Bob’s Big Boy, and you can give me the assignment?’ So, it was a ploy.

“She knew,” he said. “It had been raining, so I had a raincoat. She said, ‘I saw you walking in that raincoat.’ I said, ‘What the hell is wrong with that?’ She said, ‘I thought you were stuck up or something.’ I said, ‘Oh.’ But that was our first date.”

Dan and Candy married on November 14, 1981, and have been needling each other with love ever since.

“Candy lived in a mobile home with her mother,” he said. “She grew up in Sylmar. We moved in there. It’s amazing. Thank God for her job as a hairdresser. Paid for both our babies. Good work. Then she got tired of [the hairdresser job] and stayed off and took care of our two young daughters for a couple of years. Not very long.”

At Dan’s suggestion, Candy checked out banking. She liked what she saw.

“I was shooting for a Security Pacific branch,” he said. “I see the tellers. They have good hours. They’re off at three o’clock. I said to Candy, ‘How about a bank?’ And she’s so smart. Money for her is like this [snaps fingers]. She worked her way up from teller, went into mortgage, reverse mortgage, then retired.”

Dan Watson’s Security Pacific Bank and Glendale Federal assignments in the 1980s and 1990s included photographing Los Angeles-area executives and employees, and he used a fish-eye lens to shoot these team members in August 1986. Photo: Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

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First Major Award: Glendale News-Press, 1981

In early 1981, before Dan and Candy married, he won his first major news photography award. It was a Certificate of Excellence in the Forest Lawn Journalism Awards, presented by the Greater Los Angeles Press Club, for a photo he shot for the Glendale News-Press of cops arresting a couple of armed robbery suspects.

“I happened to hear on the (police) scanner that a store was being robbed right down the street,” Dan said. “I drove right there and saw the getaway car was just coming out of the place being robbed. So, I got in front of them, they came in behind me, and I drove slowly because I could hear the cops were right around the corner.

The first major award Dan Watson earned as a news photographer was in February 1981 for a news photo of Glendale police arresting a pair of suspects, published in the Glendale News-Press on October 30, 1980. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“So, I drove slowly, slowing these guys down, and they zipped around me, and I followed them, and then the cops got them,” he said. “The guy’s out on the ground with the guns. It was a good picture. The cop was with the gun, good, the guy was on the ground looking away, and the other guy was coming out of the car with his hands up, but you couldn’t see any faces. Key to any picture like that is the face and the expression.”

Dan’s photo earned second place at the Press Club’s 23rd Annual Journalism Awards on February 28, 1981.

“The picture that won was by photographer Tom Jagoe, with the Daily News,” he said. “Same scenario, but he shot it from a bridge with a long lens, which made it more dramatic. Cops had the AR weapons, so that made it more dramatic, and it was a better news picture, and I think there were some faces. That’s what I always attributed it to.

“Typical of all my awards throughout my career,” Dan said, with characteristic self-deprecation. “Very few first places.”

He has a prized photo of him holding his award standing with CBS News legend Walter Cronkite, who was honored with the Press Club’s Joe Quinn Memorial Award the same night.

Dan Watson receives a “Certificate of Excellence” award for his second-place arrest photo from the Greater Los Angeles Press Club on February 28, 1981, and meets broadcast journalist legend Walter Cronkite. Photo: Garry Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I didn’t know Walter Cronkite was going to be there,” Dan said. “My dad grabbed him for the picture. He knew the importance of it. You can see the way the plaque is. He said, ‘Tip the plaque so we don’t get a reflection.’ Typical [laughter].

“Candy would have loved to come and support me, but she didn’t know about it until after it happened, because I didn’t tell her I was getting the award.”

Dan said he took flak about her missing the big occasion for the next 42 years.

He and his father Garry occasionally crossed paths on the job, too.

“On April 21, 1981, I heard the scanner call and went to cover a huge multi-vehicle crash on the northbound I-5 Freeway in Glendale,” Dan said. “The driver of a flat-bed truck was trapped in the cab. I climbed up on the bed of the truck to shoot the man being extracted from the cab. I felt a tug at my elbow and there was my dad next to me, shooting for the L.A. Daily News.

Two news photographers compete to get the best shot of first responders extricating an injured man trapped in a multi-vehicle truck crash on the I-5 Freeway on April 21, 1981. Glendale News-Press photographer Jeff Yip caught GNP colleague Dan Watson, left, and Dan’s father, Garry Watson, of the L.A. Daily News, on the scene. Garry’s photo is seen at top right; Dan’s is at bottom. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“We both shot with wide-angle lenses as the conscious man was carried down on a stretcher, both of us getting virtually the same shot. News-Press reporter Jeff Yip took a prized photo of dad and me working side by side. I can’t believe they didn’t kick us off the truck! And my picture was better!”

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Back to the Track (Jack); CBS-TV

“George Andrus, the photographer I had worked with at Hollywood Park, got the concession contract at Santa Anita Racetrack, which was called ‘Four-Footed-Fotos,’ and needed help,” Dan said. “He liked me because I worked cheap… [laughter]. No, George was a good guy. I was creative. He wasn’t, but he knew the business. He paid a lot of money to get the contract from Vic Stein, the fellow he used to work for, so he wanted to do a good job.

Horses break out of the starting gate at Santa Anita Racetrack in the 1980s. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection

“I was still working at the News-Press at that time,” he said. “So, I’d work all week at the News-Press, and the weekends – thank you, Candy – I’d go work at Santa Anita in Arcadia.

An outrider leads a horse to the starting gate in a downpour before a race at Santa Anita Racetrack in the 1980s. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I did a lot of the PR photography at Santa Anita. My boss would shoot the finish and winner’s circle stuff.

An unknown jockey goes to the whip in the stretch at Santa Anita in the 1980s. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I remember lying on my dad’s floor once and going, ‘I can’t keep doing this,’” Dan said. “It was fun, but very physical work.”

Horses work out in the early morning at Santa Anita in the 1980s, also requiring a pre-dawn wakeup for track photographer Dan Watson. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

In early 1982, a few months after Dan and Candy married, he got a call from Murray De’Atley, who had worked in Garry Watson’s photo lab years before and become a friend of Dan’s. Murray had landed a staff photographer gig at CBS Television City in Hollywood.

“Murray said, ‘Hey, Dan, you want to come and do something?’” he said. “Networking, you know. He knew I was good and not temperamental and got me a job working in the lab. He always helped me. I loved him.”

CBS staff photographers Murray De’Atley (left) and Jerry Fitzgerald chat between assignments at CBS Television City in Los Angeles, 1983. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photographic Collection.

Dan’s workload was mostly developing film and making prints. “They had a very advanced Kodak black-and-white printer, where you’d stick the machine in one side and the print would come out the other,” he said. “It was great, called the Royal Print.

“The advertising department would put together the ads you’d see in TV Guide for a show that was coming out, and they’d send us the list of the pictures they needed to be printed,” Dan said. “Some of the negatives were here, some were in New York, but they would send us a list: ‘Print this image, we need this to this size.’ Then they’d do the ads from that.”

Occasionally, he would shoot on a TV show set, but most of those assignments went to other photographers, including his friend Murray.

“He was a big guy, loud, big curly hair,” Dan said. “Every time Felix Owens (the boss) would send my friend Murray to shoot set stills on ‘All in the Family,’ Carroll O’Connor would say, ‘Get him out of here! I don’t want him in here!’ [laughter] (Owens) just kept sending him back.

“I went with Murray once and helped him shoot, and it was just…difficult. Actors have a difficult job, and they just don’t like photographers on the set.”

CBS staff photographer Murray De’Atley poses with Buddy Ebsen, star of the CBS-TV series “Barnaby Jones,” off the set at a 1980 CBS celebrity golf event in Westlake Village, California. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Back to the Track (Redux 1)

“The guy I worked for at Santa Anita, George Andrus, lost the Four-Footed-Fotos contract in 1981, after this fancy group came in (as track managers),” Dan said. “They were creative, and he wasn’t, so we lost the contract. But they called me back in because they liked what I was doing.

“They were kind of upscale, and the manager had two sons working there. He bought a color machine, so it was good for the track.”

In the early 1980s, Dan Watson again teamed with George Andrus at Santa Anita Racetrack in Arcadia, photographing the finish, winner’s circle, and publicity stills for the track. When new managers took over the photo concession, they reconnected with Dan, pictured here trackside with a Rolleiflex 120 camera (2.25″ x 2.24″). Photo: Clyde Reavis, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Dan also documented special events, including a November 1982 tour of Santa Anita by Britain’s Prince Philip, who was checking it out in preparation for the equestrian events at the 1984 Olympics to be held at the racetrack.

Santa Anita Racetrack CEO Charles Strub (third from left) guides Britain’s Prince Philip on a tour of the track and stables in November 1982 ahead of the 1984 Olympics equestrian events to be held there. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

While touring Santa Anita in November 1982, in preparation for the 1984 Olympics equestrian events to be held there, Britain’s Prince Philip called the facility “absolutely first class.” Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

In 1983, Dan bought his first Leica cameras, inspired by Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer David Hume Kennerly.

“He shot for Gerald Ford,” Dan said. “I got to meet him when we were both shooting a fundraiser at a hotel in Los Angeles. I got his book, was looking at it and reading it: ‘Oh, these are the kinds of cameras he used.’ I always wanted a Leica because it was quiet. It was like the elite camera he used.

Dan Watson took a photo of Pulitzer Prize-winner and Leica advocate David Hume-Kennerly packing a Nikon as both photographed a fundraiser for President Ronald Reagan in Los Angeles in 1983. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I got a Leica and went, ‘Eh,’” Dan said, laughing. “It was kind of a pain in the ass because you’re not looking through the lens, you’re looking through a viewfinder, so it’s quiet. When you look through a single lens reflex, there’s a mirror and when you take the picture, the mirror flops up and makes a noise, ‘cla-clank.’ But the Leicas just had the shutter, so they were very quiet.”

Back to the Track (Redux 2)

“In 1984, when I was working for Four-Footed-Fotos at Santa Anita, one of the other guys who worked there said to me, ‘Hey, we should get our own track. You and I are what’s keeping this photo concession alive,'” Dan said.

“So, we quit. We got this racetrack in Minnesota, called Canterbury Downs. We were doing the same thing.

Track photographer and photo concession owner Dan Watson pauses at the Canterbury Downs finish line during the Minnesota racetrack’s inaugural season in 1985. Photo: Reed Palmer, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I loved the horse racing. That was fun. We’d work seven days a week. I’d get behind on printing. You have to print these big 16”x20”s with the three strips, changing negatives. It was tedious work, but I was alone.

This is an example of the three-way composite spread Dan Watson would create to document a race at Canterbury Downs, showing photos of the finish, the winning horse in the Winner’s Circle, and the owners, jockeys, trainers, and families. Here, the racehorse Come Summer is featured in the Canterbury Derby on September 2, 1985, during the Minnesota racetrack’s opening season. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I was back there for a year,” Dan said. “My daughter Jennie Marie had just been born, and that was hard. But as I discovered, my partner…wasn’t a good partner, let’s put it that way. I didn’t like a lot of the personal stuff he was doing.

Horses bolt from the starting gate in the inaugural season of Canterbury Downs Racetrack in Minnesota in 1985. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“He owed me a bunch of money, and I should have kept after him, but I just said to hell with it. I don’t want to deal with it. So, I left there. I think the racetrack is still there. I don’t know if he had the contract after that or not.”

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On the Sets at ABC-TV: Shooting ‘China Beach,’ ‘Roseanne,’ ‘Home Improvement’

In 1988, Dan began what stretched into an 18-year run freelancing for ABC-TV in Century City.

He was first-call to shoot publicity stills of the network’s talent, on the sets of top-rated network series including “Roseanne” and “Home Improvement,” and big ABC events like the Academy Awards telecasts.

“I was good at it because it was like news work,” he said. “When my friend Murray De’Atley went from CBS to ABC, he went into an administrative position. He said, ’Dan, you’re a good photographer. I want to try you out on this.’

Dan Watson shoots on the Academy Awards red carpet with an early digital Nikon camera and then poses with the Oscar statue after the event with fellow ABC photographer Jim Ober in the early 1990s. Photos: Murray De’Atley, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“One of my first assignments was on ‘China Beach’ (1988-1991), a TV show about a medical evac hospital in the Vietnam War,” Dan said. “The scene we were shooting was on the beach. It was all M.O.S., which means there was no sound, so I didn’t have to worry about blimps (camera enclosure to eliminate shutter noise). I was shooting with Leicas then, so it was pretty quiet. All the talent was very nice. I shot three rolls of color and three rolls of black and white 35mm film. I got every scene a couple of times.

When shooting television production stills in the 1980s and 1990s, Dan Watson used these Leica M-3 and M-4 35mm cameras. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I turned my film in, and Murray’s boss, Hal Garb, called me. ‘Where the hell is the film? You only shot three rolls.’ ‘Didn’t I get all the scenes?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Were all the pictures good?’ ‘Yes.’

“They were used to somebody shooting 30 rolls of film,” Dan said. “It didn’t matter what it was: brrrr [motor-drive sound], you just shoot. I said, ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that was the case. I’ll do that from now on.’ It wasn’t what I was used to doing, but I understood.”

A collage of ABC show talent features individual photos by Dan Watson in the late 1980s and 1990s. Top (from left): the “Seinfeld” cast at the Emmys (from left) – Jason Alexander, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Jerry Seinfeld, and Michael Richards; John Lithgow at the American Comedy Awards; Annie Potts and Tim Curry; and Martin Sheen in “Gun” (1997). Middle (from left): Drew Carey and Christina Miller from “The Drew Carey Show”; Jimmy Smits and Dennis Franz from “NYPD Blue”; Tom Hanks; and Richard Karn and Tim Allen of “Home Improvement” (1992). Bottom: Richard Belzer and Gilbert Gottfried; Jean-Claude Van Damme, George Clooney, and Charlie Sheen; the “Roseanne” cast – Michael Fishman, Sarah Gilbert, Lecy Goranson, Roseanne Barr, John Goodman, and Laurie Metcalf; and Leslie Nielsen. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

De’Atley kept hiring Dan but made sure his friend knew he was doing him a big favor.

“I was in his office one day, and we were having a drink,” Dan said. “‘You’re only as good as your last shoot,’ Murray said to me. He was sitting back with his feet up on the desk. He opened his credenza, and there were stacks and stacks of resumes from other photographers. He said, ‘As long as you keep doing good at what you’re doing, good, but otherwise, I got plenty to choose from.’”

ABC Photo Department Producer Murray De’Atley and his not-indispensable ace lensman Dan Watson lined up for a shot at a company event in the 1990s. Photographer unknown. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Undaunted by such intimidation, Dan said, “I just kept going. I never really liked the job because everything was a fight. The director didn’t want you there. The stars didn’t want you there. But I got on the set with the directors because of my news background, and I was good with the talent.”

Another photo collage gathers more ABC-TV talent Dan Watson shot in the late 1980s and 1990s. Top (from left: James Woods; Tim Allen and Barbara Walters; Danny Glover. Middle: Frank Sinatra, Hector Elizondo, Arsenio Hall. Bottom: Bob Saget from “America’s Funniest Home Videos” (1992); Elizabeth Taylor; Rose Marie and Morey Amsterdam. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Dan recalled a few set managers hassled him about his unblimped cameras early on.

“They’d say, ‘Where’s your blimp?’ I’d say, ‘These are Leicas. Listen to this.’ They couldn’t hear anything; it was that quiet. ‘I don’t care. You need a blimp.’ [laughter] ‘This is what I got. You want me to leave?’

The noisier did Nikons present a problem on active sets, though, if left unblimped.

“The (store-bought) blimp for my Nikon was $750, and I was not making that much on all these shoots,” Dan said. “So, I figured out how to do it and made my own out of a plastic Pelican box. It worked great.

This was the first version of Dan Watson’s foam-filled Pelican box, repurposed as a sound “blimp” for a Nikon N2000 35mm camera to shoot silently on TV sets, circa late 1980s.

“Like my Uncle Coy making his light-beam focuser on the old cameras, or my Great-Uncle George making his own aerial camera before that – they didn’t just go to the store and buy it. They had to make their own. So, I made three blimps and saved all that money.”

Watson photographic innovations: At left, the revolutionary “Lite Beam Focuser” Dan’s uncle Coy Watson Jr. invented in the 1940s as an accessory to 4″x5″ Speed Graphic cameras as a night-time focusing aid. Half a century later, Dan crafted a “sound blimp” for a 35mm camera by carving out the foam inside a plastic Pelican box. His great-uncle George Watson created an 4″x5″ aerial camera in 1919 from an early Speed Graphic camera (right), adding handles. George also used the higher speed of the back shutter with the focus fixed at infinity, techniques which made aerial photography more practical when shooting from an open-cockpit airplane. Photos: Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Camera noise aside, Dan explained another reason studios and stars were so camera-shy about stills.

“When I worked on ‘Roseanne’ and those TV shows, in the ’80s and ’90s, it was when a lot of people were selling negative stories about celebrities to magazines,” he said. “The studio and actors were always scared to death some picture of them with a little kid or something would get out to the terrible tabloids. So, they would take our film. Very rarely did we get any shots because they were worried about where they were going to end up. I understand that.”

Dan Watson was the set stills photographer for “Roseanne,” and shot this photo of the cast during the ABC-TV series’ premiere season in 1988. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Dan shot stills during the first two seasons of “Roseanne” (1988 and 1989). He said he and the show’s namesake star Roseanne Barr got along okay on the set. “I got a picture of her, where she’s got me by the shirt like she’s going to punch me in the jaw. We got to the point where she liked me.”

Roseanne Barr clowns with “Roseanne” set photographer Dan Watson – packing unblimped cameras – between scenes during the ABC-TV series’ first season in 1988. Photo: Gene Trendl, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Barr’s co-star John Goodman was more difficult, Dan recalled. “At that point, I think he was still drinking. He was very heavy. He’d blow a line, and you can’t blame anybody else. ‘It’s you, the photographer. Get him out of there. He’s bothering me.’ I got that a lot.

John Goodman and Roseanne Barr tank up during a “Roseanne” taping in the early 1990s. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“You’ve got four cameras on a show like this, and you’re shooting between the cameras to the talent over here,” Dan said. “I’m wearing all black with blimped cameras. There’s no noise or anything. And he would stop the scene and come out and grab me and kick me out.

John Goodman and Roseanne Barr sing a song on the “Roseanne” set in the late 1980s. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“The directors couldn’t say anything because they wanted to keep rolling,” he said. “But that was a constant thing, many different shows. They have a hard job. I understand that.”

Bruce Willis surprises Roseanne Barr while taping the end credits for “Dear Mom and Dad,” Season 1, Episode 22 of the ABC-TV series “Roseanne” in 1989. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Working on “Home Improvement” (1991-1999) was far less dramatic than “Roseanne,” Dan said. “That was a good set.”

“Home Improvement” stars Richard Karn and Tim Allen donned kilts to tape a scene for the episode “Rites and Wrongs of Passage” in Burbank in September 1992. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I looked a lot like (series co-star) Richard Karn, who played the Al Borland character. Murray said, ‘When you’re on the set, make sure you get a picture of you and Al Borland together.’

“Home Improvement” star Richard Karn and ABC still photographer Dan Watson mug on the show’s set, early 1990s. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“Everybody…Tim Allen was great,” Dan said. “The wife (Patricia Richardson) was a little touchy. There’s always one. All in all, ‘Home Improvement’ was a really good set.”

In November 1993, at the heights of their popularity, “Home Improvement” star Tim Allen and ABC-TV News legend Barbara Walters sat down for an interview for her top-rated “Barbara Walters Special.” Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

Both Candy and Dan Watson worked behind the scenes at the 1993 Emmy Awards, telecast by ABC from the Pasadena Civic Auditorium on September 19. She wrangled talent in the green room and Dan shot the red carpet arrivals and awards.

Candy and Dan Watson at the 1993 Emmy Awards. Photo: Murray De’Atley, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

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A Formal Affair: L.A. County Natural History Museum

From 1994-1996 Dan served as the staff photographer for the Los Angeles County Natural History Museum at Exposition Park near Downtown L.A.

While on-the-fly news photography emphasized telling the story over technical quality, he learned museum photography was more formal.

In the 1990s, Dan Watson produced a photo collage of rare artifacts from the collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History in Downtown Los Angeles. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“Shooting for a newspaper, my dad always cut corners – the grain structure in the film wasn’t as important,” Dan said. “All of a sudden, I go to the Museum of Natural History, and we’re shooting 8”x10” negatives. The whole thing was quality and quality control.

“Dick Meier, one of my friends who just died, got me the job there the day after the ’94 earthquake (on January 17),” he said. “We had to ride the train down there, then take a bus, and then walk a half mile just to get to the Museum.

Dan Watson arranged and photographed this display of items offered in the L.A. County Museum of Natural History’s gift shop in the 1990s. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“Dick was a good boss, even though he was an L.A. County employee,” Dan said. “‘I’m here at 6:30, I leave at 3:01,’ he said. ‘Everything in between, we can do.’ I was the type that just stayed until it’s done. He said, ‘I don’t like that because we fought with the union to make sure you have the right to not do that.’

“But that job was fun,” he said. “We got to shoot things like Walt Disney’s original animation stand. Fred Astaire had a collection of shoes there and I photographed those. It was very documentary, not very creative. You’d put in the scale (to show size), and I learned lighting and things like that.

The L.A. County Museum of Natural History housed Walt Disney’s 1930s animation stand in the 1990s. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I did a few creative things in association with the Petersen Automotive Museum,” Dan said. “Any artifacts that were going to be on display at the Petersen, I got to creatively put into a nice group shot.

Dan Watson photographed rare vintage oil cans from the L.A. County Museum of Natural History’s collection for a display at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles in the 1990s. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“They had some beautiful glass hood ornaments. Dick said, ‘Go ahead, be creative.’ I did multiple exposures.

A multiple exposure on a single frame shows views of a translucent auto hood ornament on display at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles in the 1990s. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“I remember having to shoot a knife from the Philippines,” he said. “It was a dagger. On one side was the male version, it was just a decoration. On the other side was the female. Now, how are we going to get those in one shot? So, I did a triple exposure on a single frame of film. Dick wasn’t creative that way, but he appreciated that.

A triple exposure on one frame of film of an ancient Philippine dagger from the L.A. County Museum of Natural History shows the male and female characteristics on opposite sides in a single image. Photo: Dan Watson, courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

“Some other things I shot, Dick said, ‘You can’t do that.’ ‘Watch me!’ I’d say. But he was a good guy.”

Dan Watson photographed these rare 1920s Boyce Moto-Meter Moon and Universal Arrowmeter temperature gauges for the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles in the 1990s. Courtesy Watson Family Photo Collection.

The museum gig was fun while it lasted. “You never make any money doing this job, but I was making decent money,” Dan said – until L.A. County cut its budget, eliminated his staff photographer post, and laid him off.

Dan looked closer to home for his next assignments, and connected with The Signal newspaper in nearby Valencia, where he worked three tours from 1998-2024 totaling almost two decades. That saga unfolds in Part 4 of the Watson Chronicles.

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More of the Watson Chronicles to come:

Part 1: Photographer Dan Watson Retires from The Signal

Part 2: Tracing Four Generations of ‘Hollywood’s First Family’

Part 3: Dan Watson, Last of 10 Family Photographers

Part 4: Dan Watson Triple Play at The Signal (1998-2024)

Part 5: Dan Watson Saluted by Santa Clarita City Council & SCV Press Club

Part 6: Epilog: Back to the Future: Dan Watson’s Old Habits Die Hard

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Stephen K. Peeples, an award-winning Santa Clarita journalist and Grammy-nominated producer, was Online Editor and a colleague of Dan Watson at The Signal from 2009-2011. Special thanks to Leon Worden, Susan Shapiro, Michele Buttelman, Carol Rock, Bryan Kneiding, Richard Budman, and especially Dan Watson and the Watson Family Photo Collection for their assistance in producing this series.