William B. Hutchinson (1909 –1997) was an physician and surgeon, and the founder of both the Pacific Northwest Research Foundation and the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in his native Seattle, Washington. The latter facility is named in memory of his younger brother, Fred Hutchinson, a Major League Baseball pitcher and manager whose life and career were cut short by lung cancer in 1964 at the age of 45.

The son of a general practitioner, Hutchinson was raised in Seattle and attended the University of Washington, where he played baseball for the Huskies and graduated in 1931. He passed up a professional baseball tryout to attend medical school at McGill University in Montreal, and graduated in 1935. After completing his surgical residency in Baltimore, Maryland, Hutchinson returned to Seattle to practice.

His experience as a cancer surgeon led him to spearhead a drive for research and treatment centers for the disease in his native city. The PNRF, now the Pacific Northwest Diabetes Research Institute, was founded in 1956; the FHCRC was created in 1965 and officially founded in 1975.

Hutchinson was on the staff at Swedish for 40 years. He was also team doctor for the Seattle Rainiers baseball team for years. Dr. Hutchinson received many awards, including Seattle's First Citizen Award in 1976 and a doctorate in humanities from Seattle University in 1982. He was a longtime youth baseball coach and was presented with the College of Baseball Classic Award in 1993, and inducted into the UW Husky Hall of Fame in 1995.

Interview conducted by Emmett Watson on July 18, 1985. This interview is part of the Donald Schmechel Oral History Collection. Don Schmechel, who was a member of the Seattle Public Library Foundation board, began this project with Seattle Public Library in 1984, with the Museum of History & Industry (MOHAI) brought on board as a partner in early 1985. Schmechel himself worked to raise the funding for the project, and volunteered his time to manage the project, and to conduct interviews along with a crew of volunteers. Originally titled the Videotaping Historic Figures (VHF) Program, the project interviewed 91 people, and MOHAI holds the interviews for 32 of these individuals.