Bill (aka. "Little Willie") was not only a close friend, but an asset to John Tyler. We lost contact after graduation. In 1977 at the age of 31, Bill lost his life in an auto accident in Phoenix, Az. The story is in the link below.
Bill, myself, and Baldwin gave the coaches a few headaches. I asked Bill one day why he wore his sunglasses all the time, even at night. Bill simply said, "When you are cool, the sun shines all the time". Well, the sun got a little dimmer in 1977.
We all miss you brother.
Walt Chatham
http://radiofreephoenix.com:80/billcompton.html
I remember Bill Compton on the radio in Phoenix. After graduation from A&M several of my classmates and I ended up in Phoenix working for Motorola Semiconductor. I had no idea that Bill was living there until one night I happened to be playing with my FM radio jacking up the Local Oscillator to pick up incoming aircraft on approach to Sky Harbor airport. (aircraft traffic operates at just above 108 mhz, which is the upper end of the commercial FM band)…All of a sudden I heard this deep, mahogany-golden voice come out of the speaker. I listened for a few minutes and thought to myself…”I have heard this voice somewhere” so I called into the station and asked to talk to the DJ that was on air. Bill came on the phone and I asked him where he was from and he said that he was from Tyler. We had a nice conversation about growing up in Tyler, JTHS and where we were, when… I left Phoenix in ’73 for San Francisco and Silicon Valley and never had any more contact with him. Bill was always a quiet, laid back, good looking, cool kind of guy.
(Donnie Walton, Facebook, 4/26/09):
Bill Compton could pretty much be successful with any style. In fact, if I remember correctly, he pretty much MADE the style.
Bill Compton and I, along with Joe Jeter, were classmates at Marsh Elementary in the third grade. Bill was a cool dude even back then, at about the age of 8 years old!
Walt Chatham
Bill (aka. "Little Willie") was not only a close friend, but an asset to John Tyler. We lost contact after graduation. In 1977 at the age of 31, Bill lost his life in an auto accident in Phoenix, Az. The story is in the link below. Bill, myself, and Baldwin gave the coaches a few headaches. I asked Bill one day why he wore his sunglasses all the time, even at night. Bill simply said, "When you are cool, the sun shines all the time". Well, the sun got a little dimmer in 1977. We all miss you brother. Walt Chatham http://radiofreephoenix.com:80/billcompton.htmlDelbert Kenneth "Ken" Thompson
(John Evans, email to Jim Connally, 4/26/09):I remember Bill Compton on the radio in Phoenix. After graduation from A&M several of my classmates and I ended up in Phoenix working for Motorola Semiconductor. I had no idea that Bill was living there until one night I happened to be playing with my FM radio jacking up the Local Oscillator to pick up incoming aircraft on approach to Sky Harbor airport. (aircraft traffic operates at just above 108 mhz, which is the upper end of the commercial FM band)…All of a sudden I heard this deep, mahogany-golden voice come out of the speaker. I listened for a few minutes and thought to myself…”I have heard this voice somewhere” so I called into the station and asked to talk to the DJ that was on air. Bill came on the phone and I asked him where he was from and he said that he was from Tyler. We had a nice conversation about growing up in Tyler, JTHS and where we were, when… I left Phoenix in ’73 for San Francisco and Silicon Valley and never had any more contact with him. Bill was always a quiet, laid back, good looking, cool kind of guy.
(Donnie Walton, Facebook, 4/26/09):
Bill Compton could pretty much be successful with any style. In fact, if I remember correctly, he pretty much MADE the style.
Michael Beggs (Ramey Elem) (Beggs)
Bill Compton and I, along with Joe Jeter, were classmates at Marsh Elementary in the third grade. Bill was a cool dude even back then, at about the age of 8 years old!I am saddened to learn of his death.
Mike Beggs
Sandy Young (Durham)
I just received this link from Carole Compton Glenn, Bill's sister. She was so pleased to find our website and see Bill's In Memory page."Bill was inducted into the Arizona Music & Entertainment Hall of Fame a few
years ago. In case they would like to post this, the link is:
http://www.facebook.com/l/1dce3;www.azmusichalloffame.org/bio_bc.html"