Will Morse

Will Morse was born Oct. 25th, 1949 at Medina Community Hospital in Medina, OH. He was the firstborn of his parents William Thomas (commonly known as Bill by some and Tom by others) and Lillian Brooker Morse. While still quite young, they moved to Cleveland, OH and then to Parma Heights, OH where he grew up with his 3 brothers – Mitch, Mike and Kevin and then a much younger sister Liz.

After high school, he enlisted in the US Navy and served in two main posts – one in Argentia, Newfoundland where he met his wife-to-be, Dolores Skanes, and then the Grand Turks Island in the West Indies. Following that, he went to Cleveland State University and earned his degree in Computer Science. He worked in Cleveland for a year, but then accepted a post with Energy Reserves Group (later known as BHP Petroleum) in Wichita, Kansas.

While in Wichita, Dolores came to visit him as a friend, but left to go back home with an engagement ring on her finger. The next summer on August 2nd, 1980, they tied the knot in Placentia, Newfoundland – her home town and settled in Wichita. In August 1981, they bought their first home mainly because they wanted to get a dog. Along came Buster – a yellow Lab. In Oct. 1982, the next addition came to the family in the form of our two-legged son, Colin. Buster and Colin became fast friends and Buster guarded Colin while he slept.

Will was very involved in Colin’s life as he grew up. They both shared a love of dinosaurs and he had Colin knowing all their names and which period of time they existed. Dolores got her education in dinosaurs listening to them talking about it all. Colin was also active in T-ball, soccer, basketball, swimming when young and Will never missed a game unless he was out of town. In 1st grade, Colin joined Cub Scouts and then they really started doing fun things together. Being an Eagle Scout himself, he encouraged Colin and when he became a Boy Scout, Will served as committee member and assistant Scout Master. They went on many camp outs but the real adventure began when Colin became old enough for Sea Scouts. They did a canoe trip to the Boundary Waters in MN, a scuba diving trip to Cozumel, and others. Will was a very proud father the day Colin received his Eagle Scout.

Will had lifelong passion for physics, history and music that he passed on to his son. He was constantly reading and learning and keeping up with the latest developments in scientific community. A lot of this reading was done while listening to many of his favorite albums. He started playing guitar in high school and continued playing for the rest of his life.

In 1986, BHP Petroleum transferred Will to Houston, TX and we lived in F.M.1960 area for 15 years. While there in 1993, we lost Buster, but just a few months later, a black Lab we named Cabot came into our lives. After 21 years with BHP, he decided to go to work at Anadarko Petroleum in The Woodlands. This prompted us to sell our house in the 1960 area and move to April Sound right after Colin graduated high school and left for Texas Tech University.

Will always dreamed of owning a boat and since April Sound had a marina, it seemed like the logical place to move. Will loved his boat and would spend much time on Lake Conroe relaxing as he drove all around the lake. In 2009 after 16 ½ years of faithful companionship, we lost Cabot, but again, hated the empty house so Zoe – a chocolate Lab entered our lives and started out as Colin’s dog, but when he moved to New York City, she quickly became our baby. Will worked at Anadarko for 5 years before moving on to Chevron –first in Bellaire and then downtown Houston until his retirement in April 2014, but we remained living in April Sound.

Will & Dolores always had a love of travel, especially road trips that were not super planned and cruises as long as he had a balcony to sit and enjoy the water. Flexibility was always important because there was always places to go and things to see that were unknown till we drove by them. Hence when planning retirement years, we sold our home in April Sound and bought a 5th wheel RV and started planning huge road trips lasting 5 to 6 months over the summer months while escaping the Houston heat. In 2014 and 2015, we visited 19 states and the 10 provinces in Canada. We also got to take a South American cruise through Argentina, Falklands, Uruguay and Chile in 2015. Our plan for 2016 was to do an Alaska/Yukon trip with an RV caravan group with side trips to Washington and Oregon – the only two states he had never been in.

Will was preceded in death by his father William, his brother Mitchell, his beloved dogs – Buster & Cabot, parents-in-law – Bride & Walter Skanes, and sister-in-law, Paula Skanes. He leaves to mourn: his loving wife Dolores; the pride of his life his son, Colin; his dog, Zoe; his mother, Lillian; brothers, Michael (Susan) Morse, Kevin (Maureen) Morse; sister, Elizabeth McCully; Special Aunt Mariam; nephews, Damian Meade, Mike McCully, Elliott McCully, Alex McCully, Nick Skanes; niece, Donna McCully; sister-in-law Patricia (Jack) Meade and brother-in-law Walter “Bud” Skanes plus a long list of friends.