William Henry Wegner

William H. Wegner, Ph.D., of Trenton, NJ passed away on Tuesday, March 12, 2024., at the age of 93. Professor Wegner, known as Bill, was a man of wide-ranging passions. He loved reading the New York Times every morning and cutting out articles for further perusal, Book VI of Homer's Iliad, spontaneous recitation of lines from Shakespeare, homemade cookies, hardcover books-especially old ones, Chuang Tzu's Butterfly Dream, his many dogs (Pepper, Chita, Boris, Bruno, Nelson and Walker), Bach's St. John Passion, Tusenbach's lines about the trees in Chekhov's Three Sisters, visiting blue jays in his backyard and so very much more. He loved his friends and family spread around the country and overseas, and most of all his wife of 56 years, Maria (Cortes) Wegner, who predeceased him in February 2020.
Bill was born in Fond du Lac, WI on August 11th-the same day as his mother's birthday-in the year 1930 and grew up in the small town of Waupun, WI. He first caught the acting bug at age 15, playing Roger Crosby in The Cat and the Canary, a role that required his character tumble dead out of a closet, eliciting gratifying gasps of surprise from the audience. He would go on to study with famed acting teacher Alvina Krause (AK) at Northwestern University, performing in productions there and at Krause's summer stock playhouse in Eagles Mere, PA. Moving to NYC to pursue a career in acting, he took voice lessons with an instructor remembered only as "The Maestro" in the thick-walled Ansonia Building and got a surprising callback from The Actors Studio despite not uttering a single word, having only participated in the audition to support a friend. While in New York, he crossed paths and may have turned down a job to be the assistant to Joseph Papirofksy (Joe Papp), who he deemed to be going nowhere, and went to see a friend and fellow Northwestern grad in the initial performance of The Fantasticks-a show he appraised as "slight" and destined to have a short run.
But it was also in New York City where he met his wife Maria Cortes, a nurse at St. Vincent's Hospital, and where the two of them began raising their son on 1 Jane Street in Greenwich Village. After a brief stint studying ancient Greek with Moses Hadas at Columbia University, Bill switched tracks and obtained his Ph.D. from NYU, writing his doctoral dissertation on The Representation of the American Civil War on The New York Stage 1860-1900. This led to a professorship at Trenton State College (now the College of New Jersey), where he stayed for over 30 years until his retirement in 1997-teaching, directing plays and publishing various articles, including ones on Krause and the legendary Russian director Konstantin Stanislavsky.
Bill enjoyed traveling to see his grandkids in Taiwan and relatives across the U.S., while also relishing time spent in his cherished home in the Hiltonia section of Trenton, NJ, where he lived for over 50 years. Special thanks to his aide, Florence Agyei, and also to Nancy Friedman who helped care for his body and spirit over the past several years. Bill will be extraordinarily missed and is survived by sons Carl and Paul, daughters-in law Ann and Rhonda, grandchildren CJ, Jessica and Loretta, and many relatives and close friends. Donations may be made in his memory to the Jane Goodall Institute at: janegoodall.org