Happy days...
Being uncertain which was the most appropriate, I posted an R.I.P. and snap on a couple of other forums here.
I flew quite a bit with Bill in the 70s when I was part of a small mining operation in a remote part of the west coast (now the "Tarkine Wilderness"). It's no exaggeration to say that dozens of people living and working in NW Tasmania and the islands were dependent on Billy's skills and generosity for their livelihoods. Not to mention the fact that the emergency services could often call on him for work that no-one else had the ability to do, like landing on the west coast beaches.
Here's a little story from my own experience.
One day I arrived at Smithton strip after a visit to Hobart, needing a flight back into our mine. When Bill turned up he told me that he probably couldn't take me as he had some freight to deliver for another (Wolfram) prospecting site at the Interview River - an even more remote location than ours. The guys working there, one of whom, Merv, I'd met, had already destroyed some vehicles crossing the estuaries on the coast and were pretty much reliant on Bill for resupply. Never having been to this wild region I was anxious to see it and suggested that I hop in (no baggage) and have him drop me off on the return leg given that there didn't seem to be much of a payload.
He turned to me and said "The problem is that's the stuff I'm taking...". It was about two dozen cases of AN60 gelignite plus the associated detonators and fuse. He also said "I've never taken anyone for a joyride in there anyway, it's too dangerous, there 's no strip." All of which (aged about 30) made the trip even more interesting, so I made up various compelling reasons why it might be a good idea - which worked.
We loaded the plane (snap attached) with the explosives plus a bewildered looking small dog, a cat (in a sack in the pod), a few loaves of bread and a case of beer. At the last minute Billy took the box of detonators out, saying, "next trip." Never let it be said that he was reckless.
Even though I'd been living in the West Coast bush for a while, the flight down the coastal plain of the Western Tiers was impressively bleak and forbidding with few viable emergency landing places even on the beaches.
A few minutes out from the Interview River, Bill pointed out the approximate location of the prospecting site. I couldn't see anything except the river itself, winding through a button-grass plain, plus a yellow dot which presumably was their dozer. A bit lower and closer I could just about identify a small shack but still nothing resembling a strip. Then I spotted the wind-sock - which was a fertiliser sack attached to a bush pole standing alongside a slightly different coloured green area running NE/SW. They'd run the dozer up and down on the button-grass a few times to make something vaguely resembling a landing strip.
The landing was how I imagine a carrier landing feels - assuming the carrier had a deck turfed with barely flattened button-grass. When we'd come to a halt - very, very, rapidly - there was no-one about at all. We piled up the cases of gelignite and placed the sack containing the cat, plus the provisions, such as they were, on top, and tied the quivering dog's lead to the wind-sock pole. Getting the aircraft moving again for take-off required full throttle as the wheels heaved from hole to hole. It was the only time when flying with Bill that I seriously doubted that we'd get off, lightly loaded though we were at that point (and I never saw the fuel gauge in his planes very far past the "E" mark). But we did, as ever, and he dropped me off at our rough but hard gravel airstrip.
I imagine those of us who knew and flew with Bill regularly could fill a book with stories although some would probably best be left unwritten! I think most, probably all of us, will remember him very fondly as someone who was always ready to help in any way he and his sometimes battle-damaged aircraft could. It's no exaggeration to say that we will not see his like again.
If anyone's interested I can put up a couple more snaps and some other reminiscences.
Roy