He served with noted poet Joyce Kilmer, Father Duffy, and William "Wild Bill" Donovan.

[4][2][3] With the Armistice, the war was over and Watson returned to New York, opening his own art studio on East 34th Street in Manhattan.

[2] During the Great Depression, many of Watson's works appeared in pulp magazines, such as Argosy, Detective Fiction Weekly, and Railroad Stories.

[5][6][7] David Saunders has described Watson's work for the pulps as "masterful"[2] and wrote that his "...confident drawing style, bold compositions, and joyous color schemes were very influential, especially for the younger pulp artist, Rudolph Belarski, who worked with Watson for Argosy.

[9] In addition, he drew magazine interior art and advertisements; hunting, fishing, and camping scenes for calendars for Brown & Bigelow; and illustrations for book jackets.