William S. Wilkinson

WILKINSON WILLIAM SEBASTIEN WILKINSON DIed peacefully in his sleep on February 26, 2009. Just after midnight, Mary Fay, his wife of fifty-five years, kissed him goodnight for the last time. He left seven children, ten grandchildren, six great grandchildren and countless friends, relatives and admirers. He would have been 90 years old today. He was born in Baltimore on November 9, 1919, and spent boyhood summers on the Chesapeake Bay and at Pimlico. The bay and the racetrack fueled his lifelong passions for the sea and for sports. He and his brother, George, not only witnessed Seabiscuit''s victory over War Admiral in the "Match of the Century," they won a sizable bet, a crucial element in any re-telling of the story. He and George were adventurous teenagers who hitchhiked to the Grand Canyon, to the Deep South, and to the iconic track at Saratoga Springs where they ended up in a poker game with Joan Crawford. Utterly star-struck, they lost most their stake and had to sneak into the races the next day by scaling the fence and evading track security. At twenty, they collected their winnings from a football pool they started together, hitchhiked to Nova Scotia, and had a replica of the famous fishing schooner "Bluenose" built there. Then they sailed it back to Baltimore themselves. By this time Bill was fully involved in an ongoing love affair with the written word, often reading several books at once. He was fascinated by history, philosophy, theology, and not only the great literature of our times, but of all times. He was a Renaissance man in the best sense, and his opinions on the nature of every aspect of life were deeply considered, and passionately shared. (Although there are many members of his family that still think he was wrong about both Eddie Murray and Earl Weaver). From 1936 on Bill only missed the Preakness Stakes twice when he was a PT boat commander in the South Pacific during WW II. Although a wounded and decorated veteran, he never told the garden-variety, yawn-inducing "war stories." He recounted endlessly entertaining fiascos that were always based in an infectious humility. He attended Georgetown Law School on the GI Bill, and always noted that he graduated 80th out of 160, right in the middle of his class, or "perfectly mediocre" as he liked to put it. As a career officer for the CIA during the height of the Cold War, he loved to amuse his family and friends with declassified hilarity, reflecting more on the surreality of the struggle than on the implicit heroism of his job, or the many classified successes that he had as he rose through the ranks. But it was in parenting with his wife, Fay, that he found his true calling, involved in every aspect of his kids'' lives; a natural as a father. In 1968 the McLean Boys Club wanted to raise registration rates for their sports programs. He was outraged (not to mention the father of six boys who needed their registration fees paid). He organized like-minded parents, and formed the rival McLean Youth Athletic Association. Under his leadership as commissioner, the MYAA became so successful that after a few years he forced a merger with the Boys Club (now with reasonable registration rates, of course). Bill was a deeply religious man. After his own children went off to start their own lives, he worked for more than twenty years with SPRED, a program for special-needs kids at St. Luke Catholic Church in McLean. Services were previously held. To understand Bill Wilkinson is to understand the true nature of faith, of fatherhood, of family, of friendship. And of fun.