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<em>William Lloyd Welter, Jr.</em> came into this world in the fall of 1932 with a smile on his face, and it was still there when he left us in the spring of 2009. He was a cheer­ful, uplifting presence in everything he did, and even Beast Barracks couldn’t dampen his outlook.</p>
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Aside from smiling through, Bill’s ap­proach to cadet life was to stay busy, an at­titude the Academic Department obligingly endorsed as it piled on. His focus was wider than theirs, however, and he sought diversion from their midnight oil. A superb athlete, he threw himself into swimming, water polo and tennis, lettering in all three.</p>
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A measure of his intensity and will was that he swam the toughest event, the individual medley, and won as much on enthusiasm as on his considerable ability. In his last year, the water polo team, in the finals of the Eastern Collegiate Conference championship, trailed 5-2 at the half. Bill scored a legendary five goals in the second half, for an 8-5 Army win.</p>
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As if athletics weren’t diversion enough from the demands of academics, he found an­other on the Combined Arms trip in the sum­mer of 1953. At Eglin AFB, Bill met Sherry Lee Mitchell, and, in his usual direct way, he added sharing her life to his goals of graduat­ing and flying.</p>
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At June Week, he achieved all three. Finishing proudly near the bottom of the class, he took his new bride to San Marcos, TX, for flight training. He later got his wings at Ft. Rucker, AL, where the Welters also cel­ebrated the arrival of their firstborn, Melissa. Following a tour at Ft. Benning, GA, they moved on to Ft. Eustis, VA, where daughter Virginia was born.</p>
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Seeking to expand his horizons, he applied for graduate school and earned his Master of Science degree in aeronautical and aerospace engineering from Virginia Tech in 1961. After a tour in Korea, he went back to Ft. Rucker to the Transportation Aircraft Test and Support Activity, determining support requirements for new Army aircraft. Daughter Mary joined the family during this tour.</p>
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He sought and won assignment to the Navy Test Pilot School at Patuxent NAS, MD, graduating in 1964. That earned him four productive years at the Aviation System Test Activity at Edwards AFB, CA, as the lead government test pilot on the XV-5A, a fan-in-wing jet aircraft with vertical takeoff and landing capability. He worked in several other projects, one of which culminated in his setting a world helicopter record for time to climb to 9,000 meters. Son Billy came along at Edwards, filling out the family.</p>
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In 1968 he went to Vietnam, to the Army Concept Team, evaluating new aviation equipment and concepts that were being in­troduced into the combat arena.</p>
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From Vietnam it was back to Ft. Eustis, where he embarked on a five-year study pro­gram in the School of Education at William & Mary to attain an Ed.D. in Higher Education Administration. Studying while serving as deputy director of the Army Air Mobility Research and Development Laboratory at the NASA-Langley Research Center, he earned his doctorate in 1975.</p>
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Bill retired from the Army in 1977. He was a master aviator, licensed for rotary and fixed wing aircraft, the latter from lighter than air to jet fighter. His military decora­tions include the Distinguished Flying Cross, Bronze Medal, Meritorious Service Medal, two Air Medals, Vietnam Gallantry Cross, and Vietnam Campaign Medal.</p>
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His professional affiliations include the Society of Experimental Test Pilots, American Helicopter Society and the American Institute of Astronautics and Aeronautics.</p>
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Retirement didn’t slow the pace of his life a bit. He worked in civil service for twenty years, taught mathematics at Thomas Nelson and Christopher Newport Colleges, and served in several civic posts. He was instrumental in the formation of WP-ORG, and he ran the ’55 Class net with an admirable mix of discipline and humor, bringing us closer than we were as cadets. Around all this, he captained a cruise boat at Busch Gardens and played tennis al­most daily.</p>
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His zest for life led to his extraordinary range of activities and interests, but that was only part of the fun for Bill. At the front of everything else stood his beloved Sherry and his family. It’s why the births of his children appear here alongside the other important way points in his life. Social obligations, class gatherings, all but the most essential claims on his time went by the boards when gradua­tions, games, anything of note came up in the lives of children and grandchildren.</p>
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Bill’s resume and his body of work belie his class standing. He called himself an engineer in goat’s clothing, but Dr. Welter was no goat; indeed he was a man of many gifts. One of his greatest was the selfless way he gave of himself No matter how daunting the tasks before him, he always had or made time for anyone in need of help.</p>
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His memorial service filled Williamsburg's Bruton Parish Church because Bill was an enthusiastic and productive member of so many disparate communities—home and family, his church, his adopted town, his class­mates, soldiers, aviators, educators, tennis pals, even what he called Busch’s brew water navy. Whatever drew us into his orbit, we all revered him for his cheerful leadership, his bound­less generosity, and that irrepressible outlook that brightened everything. Daughter Mary caught it in her eulogy, remembering how “you could feel his energy just vibrating the air around him.”</p>
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He left long before we were ready to let him go, and it’s small consolation that some­one else must have needed him more than we do.</p>
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Richer for his days among us, life goes on for his family and his many friends, and each new day dawns as a gift. They’re all welcome, but it’s nowhere near as good as it was when Bill Welter was here.</p>
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Godspeed, old friend, and happy landings.</p>
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<em>—Classmate</em></p>