William Erwin

1954 - 2025

William Erwin
05/17/1954 - 02/14/2025
William "Bill" Ellsworth Erwin, beloved husband, father, grandfather, and friend, passed away peacefully at home on Friday, February 14, 2025, after a four-year battle with colon cancer.
Bill was born on May 17, 1954, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to Emmett MacDonald Erwin, Jr. and Nell Scholl Erwin. He is preceded in death by his parents, as well as, his two uncles and namesakes, William Stokes Erwin and Ellsworth Anderson Scholl.
After growing up in Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, he attended Carnegie-Mellon University and earned a BS degree in Metallurgy and Materials Engineering in 1976. Upon graduation, he moved to the San Francisco Bay Area and began a 40 year career with Chevron. It was there where he met and married Vicki McClymond in 1979. The couple initially raised their three children in California, before moving to The Woodlands, Texas, in 1992.
Bill began his career with Chevron as a Materials Engineer at the Richmond, California, refinery. In 1984, he moved to New Orleans and two years later returned to the Bay Area. He then transferred to Houston, where he worked for Chevron Pipeline Company, writing the formation agreement and chairing the management committee for the West Texas LPG Pipeline Partnership. In 1999, he earned his MBA degree from the University of Houston and soon after began commercial work on complex international oil and gas projects, traveling all over the world. His first commercial project was the West Africa Gas Pipeline, where he worked to move surplus national gas from Nigeria to new power plants in the neighboring countries of Ghana, Togo, and Benin. His next venture took him to Angola, where he worked on the Angola LNG project, one of the largest energy projects on the African continent and the world's first LNG project supplied with associated gas. In 2010, Bill and Vicki moved to Bangkok, Thailand, where he negotiated Production Sharing contracts with China National Offshore Oil Corporation involving blocks in the South China Sea and would later complete the extension of Concession Agreements with the Kingdom of Thailand. Upon his retirement in 2016, Bill and Vicki re-patriated home to The Woodlands.
Bill enjoyed stamp collecting, cycling, scuba diving, traveling, and volunteering, specifically with The Montgomery County Food Bank and Star of Hope. But Bill's main passion and biggest joy in life was his family. He loved nothing more than having his family all together, whether small gatherings at home, holidays, or their annual family beach trip. He was fortunate to have decades of happy memories of family adventures and vacations.
He is survived by his loving wife of 45 years, Vicki; their three children, Kelly Coffman (Greg), Joseph Erwin (Whitney), and Caitlin Erwin; their six grandchildren, Victoria, Ellie, James, Dylan, Eleanor, and Cole; his siblings, Pat Hugar (Jay) and Mac Erwin (Lisa), and extended family.
There will be a Celebration of Life on Friday, March 21, at The Woodlands Methodist Church at 11:00 AM, with a reception to follow. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the William Ellsworth Erwin Memorial fund at MD Anderson Cancer Center: https://mdanderson.donordrive.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.personalCampaign&participantID=9277
Please put the following in the memo section of your donation.
William Ellsworth Erwin Memorial/MD Anderson - DIY24R.