Painter, etcher. Born in Hayward, CA in 1896. Frates first studied art in San Francisco with Wm Otto Emerson. He was active as an artist in the San Francisco Bay area from the 1920s while maintaining a studio-home in Hayward. While returning from a long motor trip in the Northwest, he died in Myrtle Creek, OR on Aug. 5, 1969. Equally facile with oil, watercolor, and pastel, he painted landscapes of the Mother Lode country and the San Francisco Bay area. Member: Bay Region AA; Hayward AA (cofounder); Mother Lode AA; Diablo AA; Fremont AA; Santa Cruz Art League; SWA (pres.) Exh: Oakland Art Gallery, 1924-39; Calif. State Fair, 1930; Santa Cruz Art League, 1934, 1938; GGIE, 1939; Society for Sanity in Art, CPLH, 1939; Alameda Co. Fair, 1948 (1st prize); Diablo AA, 1969 (1st prize); Religious Art Festival (Monterey), 1969 (1st prize). In: Hayward Public Library; State Museum Resource Center (Sacramento); Salinas City Hall.

Artist who held a one-man show in the County Federation of Art Gallery, May 1955. “Art Association Founder Dies. Hayward – William E. Frates, 73, who with the late Elmer Stanhope founded the Hayward Art Association, died Tuesday while on a vacation motor trip that was to have included the Northwest and Canada. Traveling with Clifford Holmes of Hayward, Mr. Frates was stricken near Myrtle Creek, Ore., and died en route to a hospital there. A native and still a resident of Hayward, Mr. Frates was a founder of the Oakland Art Association. Last month he received the top purchase award in the Diablo Art Association Annual Exhibit and, last January, won the best of show award at the Religious Art Festival in Monterey. In 1967 he won the top purchase award in the Monterey Art Festival, and this painting will hang in the Salinas City Hall. He was a member of the Hayward, Mother Lode, Diablo and Fremont Art Associations, Hayward Area Historical Society, Santa Cruz Art League, and Allied Artists of Santa Clara County, and was past vice president of the Society of Western Artists. Mr. Frates is survived by three sisters… A Requiem Mass will be said… at All Saints Church… Entombment will be in Holy Sepulchre Cemetery,” Daily Review (Hayward, Ca.), Aug. 7, 1969, p. 2. “Impresario of Art Show Finds Career in Hobby by Bill Strobel. Hayward. Will Frates likes to describe himself as a ‘foot-loose, fancy-free bachelor with a packed suitcase.’ His fellow artists and particularly those who have watched him in action claim the description is not quite accurate. ‘He’s a hard-working man who loves every minute of his labor,’ they say, and by the way of illustration they point to the outdoor art show which Frates staged at the recent Alameda County Fair at Pleasanton. The open-air gallery, which featured more than 107 paintings, plus sculpture and other ‘Frates innovations,’ was termed one of the finest by a panel of art judges and critics and the most outstanding exhibit at the exposition by thousands of fairgoers. But the County Fair show is just one of innumerable projects which have kept Frates busy at a part-time hobby which turned into a full-time job. Since Frates began painting some 20 years ago for ‘relaxation and pleasure,’ his hobby has led him to remote mountain lakes in the Canadian Rockies and desolate plateaus in Mexico and throughout the Southwest. Prize winner. It has also resulted in the formation of the Hayward Art Association, been responsible for numerous art shows and exhibitions throughout California and Nevada and has won for him the 1951 popular award for water colors at the State Fair in Sacramento and the 1952 Del-Art grand prize for a water color, ‘Last Adobe at Calavaritas.’ The latter show was an invitational affair for artists throughout the United States and Canada. But perhaps the most extreme source of pride to Frates is an innovation which he developed for the Alameda County Fair. This masterpiece is a brick fountain which the artist constructed with the help of Lansing Wood, fairgrounds foreman and Anthony Rabello, a fairgrounds worker. ‘None of us knew anything about brickwork, but look what we did,’ he said with obvious pride. Four years ago, Frates took over the County Fair art department and personally visited Bay area artists until he had obtained 110 paintings. Of these, 60 were for the show, and art became one of the mainstays of the County Fair. In succeeding years, the show expanded to such an extent that the Home Economics Building could no longer house the entries. Outdoor Gallery. Frates then got the idea for an outdoor gallery, complete with green grass and trees. He discussed the plan with Wray L. Bergstrom, fair secretary-manager, who liked it. Frates designed the open-air gallery and Bergstrom’s men constructed it. This year more than 400 paintings were submitted and some 100 were accepted for the show. Frates also figured that photography belonged in the art department, so Photo Chairman Earl Kenyon joined the garden gallery crew… Frates is already making plans for next year’s show. He wants more space for art in action, paintings, sculpture, and wants to open ceramics and amateur painters sections. Long Time Hobby. The Hayward artist’s ‘footloose and fancy free’ feeling came this year when he retired after 32 years as rural mail carrier, but it began many years before when he was bitten by the art bug. When he began taking holiday jaunts to remote areas with brushes and paints and was successful in selling some of this work, he learned that other Hayward area residents had a similar interest in art. They began to meet occasionally to discuss their work and plan daubing expeditions. The result of the informal meetings was the Hayward Art Association. Organized six years ago by Frates, Mrs. Ethel Grau, Elmer Stanhope, Miss Jean Hale and Miss Vicki Prioste, the association has been responsible for exhibiting the work of the Bay area artists throughout the state. Their oils and watercolors have been shown at the Virginia City Art Festival, the Santa Cruz Art Gallery, the Lodi Grape and Wine Festival, San Jose State College and the Oakland Art Gallery. The next Oakland show will be held August 28 through September 24. Association members also hold their own show annually at their gallery, 21888 Foothill Boulevard, Hayward. … After wrapping up the County Fair show, which required a minimum of 10 hours a day, Frates hit the road for Carson City, Nev., where he will judge a show of the Nevada State Art Association. He won’t linger too long in the Silver State, however, because the Hayward Art Association is planning an exhibit for the Hayward Farm, Home and Industry Show, which opens Thursday. Work? Not to Frates. ‘It’s a hobby and everyone should have a hobby,’ he explains,” and port., per Oakland Tribune, July 8, 1952, p. 34.