Will Hon
1928-2008

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Some Of Will's Many Accomplishments In NMEA:

Other Achievements:

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Below are a series of photographs showing Will and his students on some of his many field trips..

Below: Will is standing in the back row on the left.

Below: Will and Millie Graham relax on the steps of a cabin at Forfar Field Station. 

Below: Will and others enjoy a relaxing evening at Forfar Field Station, Andros Island, Bahamas.

Below: Will is standing near the center of the picture behind the wall of an Andros Island restaurant.

 

Below: Taken at Midway Cemetery, Midway, Georgia in 1992, Will stands in the back row. Students have been making rubbings of tombstones.

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Tributes to Will

Will Hon arrived at Skidaway Island in 1973 and launched the Marine Extension Service's education program that continues to this day. During his 2 decades of service he taught thousands of students and inspired hundreds of educators with his knowledge, artistry, and enthusiasm for learning and experiencing the world around us. Will combined his artistic talents with a broad factual knowledge of ecology and a grand sense of humor when teaching. As one admiring colleague put it 'His lectures wash over his audience and stick like salt spray.'

William Harris Hon entered and departed this life on the Carolina Piedmont, but his heart was always anchored to the margin of the ocean. Will’s gentle and soft-spoken nature belied his passion for, and knowledge of, the natural world around him. He was an exceptional artist, a voracious reader, a thoughtful scientist, an ever-curious intellect, and an inspired educator who wove his various talents into a tapestry that reflected an understanding of ecosystems, science, and the human element that both fascinated and engrossed his audiences.

Long before the advent of computer assisted presentations, Will would lead students through a lesson using a simple magic marker and a roll of butcher paper to illustrate ocean energy flows, currents, migratory flyways, whale anatomy, diving cormorants, and shipping routes all overlaid on a global map drawn free-hand from memory. Will would illustrate as he spoke, with greater ease than most of us can click through a “Powerpoint.” At the end of his lessons classroom teachers would rush to the front to claim their 8’ of Will Hon art, which someone once dubbed the “live sea scrolls.”

Above: One of Will's many murals.

I spent the year just prior to his retirement attempting to get Will up-to-speed using a computer, without much success. In reality, Will probably didn’t have much practical use for a computer. As on-line resources such as Google and Yahoo search engines evolved, and particularly with the advent of Wikipedia- I frequently found myself comparing the ease with which we are able to follow myriad trains of thought in a basic “search” to the way Will’s mind explored multiple facets of a lesson or in constructing an answer to a student’s question. For example, a basic Will Hon “introduction to the salt marsh” might begin with a map of Georgia showing the watersheds that feed our coastal rivers and estuaries. The discussion would lead off with mention of both phytoplankton and Spartina as the primary producers in the marsh/estuarine complex, then take a turn inland to speak of farming and fertilizers, run-off and eutophication and how it affects downstream ecosystems, then he’d take off on a tangent to describe the up-welling off the coast of South America and associated plankton blooms, anchovies, baleen whales, cormorants and pelicans, then off to the guano mines of Peru and Chile. From there he would take the students on a freighter trip through the Panama Canal, across the Gulf of Mexico, through the Straits of Florida and into the Port Authority of Savannah where the guano based fertilizer would be trucked to Plains Georgia where Jimmy Carter would use it to grow his peanuts. In all, he would come full circle using something as simple as bird droppings as the medium for the process, and making it relevant to Georgia students who were quite familiar with peanut farms. Genus!

I had the enviable pleasure and privilege of working alongside Will for the 8-years preceding his retirement. As a co-teacher for those years, I felt every part a student of his each time he and I ran a field trip together, or when I would sit in on his labs and lectures. I want to think that some of his patient teaching methods and expertise rubbed off during that time. One of Will’s greatest strengths was his life-long quest to learn more and to constantly examine the inter-relationships between all facets of life and this hunk of rock and water we call earth. We could all benefit from following that example.

Upon retiring in 1994 Will moved to Southport NC to be near his mother. He enjoyed his years in Southport and gave many of his books and paintings to the NC Maritime Museum there, and worked with his church. When he thought he was getting Alzheimer's he built an apartment onto his son's home in Anderson SC (in 2003). As it turned out, it wasn't Alzheimer's but rather a series of ministrokes that left him unable to communicate and somewhat disoriented. About a year ago [2007] Will was admitted to assisted living until about 2 weeks ago when he developed an infection and pneumonia and was admitted to the hospital, and later to the Hospice of the Upstate. Will passed away on Saturday, March 1st, [2008] There was a service in Southport, NC on March 6th.

By: Bob Williams
The University of Georgia
Marine Extension Service

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I loved Will, as did we all. I would never tire of hearing his wonderful lectures in which he sketched everything he talked about. At the end of the lecture the teacher would ask meekly if she could have the huge piece of paper Will had been sketching on, and of course he gave it to her. There must be hundreds of those beautiful murals in schools all over Chatham County.

By: Laura Lawton, Savannah teacher

Below: Will drawing birds at The University of Georgia Marine Extension Service (MAREX) in 1992.

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Will was an inspiration to all of us, taught many of us, and helped us all connect with the natural world. He was a uniquely gifted artist, educator, and friend of the earth and will be missed.

By: Anne Frick (Marine Educator/Public Service Associate, Marine Extension Service, University of Georgia)
John Crawford

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Will was a great inspiration to me during the late 70's and early 80's when I was a student at UGA, student at the Marine Resources Center on Skidaway Island, fisheries technician stationed there, and research technician at Skidaway Institute of Oceanography. We often had long talks and he allowed me to give presentations to some of the classes that came to the Marine Education Center, assist in the Aquarium and on field and collecting trips. Will was a kind and gentle soul, an inspiration to many, and a very talented artist, and naturalist and teacher. He will be missed by many. I was blessed in knowing him.

By: Scott Van Sant
NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service

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I am one of those people who came under the spell of Will Hon at an early age, and he honestly changed my life. I was a student of his in an NSTA workshop on Skidaway in 1971, my first teacher workshop ever. I showed up 7 months pregnant with my first child, and he never batted an eye. I was entranced by his artistry and the way he could talk and draw at the same time, showing the neck bones of egrets and herons as he explained their differences, or sketching the types of organisms in a coastal estuary. On the Sunday that marked the middle of the workshop he offered to arrange rides to churches or conduct an interdenominational lesson for us. Of course we chose the latter, and he launched into the history and legends about the Temple in Jerusalem, the Ark of the Covenant and related material, worshipful enough to instill reverence, yet fascinating in detail and based on many writings. A true Renaissance man, he could speak the language of literature, science, art and religion. I emerged with the conviction that marine education fits the entire curriculum, and that it was our collective task as marine educators to make known that world of water. At the end of the 2 weeks the class gave me a brown ibis [stork] t-shirt he hand-painted, a sweet reminder of his life's work and how much he gave to all of us.

By: Rosanne Fortner, Director
COSEE Great Lakes
Ohio Sea Grant Education Program

 

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Will's obituary as it appeared in the Wilmington, N. C. Star News Online can be viewed at http://www.legacy.com/StarNewsOnline/Obituaries.asp?Page=Notice&PersonID=105040916

 

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© 2008 NMEA This site is maintained by the NMEA History Committee (Sarah Richards, Chair; SRichards@saintannsyn.org)