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Terry
Registered: 06/29/04
Posts: 131
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Reply with quote | #1 |
*** PLEASE REPLY TO THE SPECIAL RECOGNITION FORUM ***
Bill Evans
December 11, 1931 - April 27, 2006
Age 74
Bill was an avid sailor, fisherman, and boatman, whose varied and colorful career included auto racing, auto body shop owner, aircraft pilot, flight school owner, lobster fishing, construction contractor and more. In 1982 Bill founded CoCo View Resort, a dedicated scuba diving resort in Roatan, Honduras and spent the next 24 years with his wife, Evelyn, managing that business as well as several others he founded in the Honduras Bay islands. He sold CoCo View in 2004 and returned to Ft. Myers where he continued to work in real estate and property development until the time of his death.
Bill was predeceased by his son, Michael, and is survived by his wife of 56 years, Evelyn, and their 4 children: Terry, Linda, Jill, Jodi; 10 grandchildren, and 3 great grandchildren. He was a great friend and surrogate father to scores of others in two countries.
There will be a memorial service, 13 May, 2006, 2PM
National Cremation Society
3453 Hancock Bridge Parkway
No. Ft. Myers, FL 33903
239-995-1113
Open to the Public
In lieu of flowers, contributions should be made to the Majken Broby Children's Home in Roatan, Honduras: Roatan Children's Fund,1966 Tice Valley Blvd. #145
Walnut Creek, CA 94595
Visit their web site at http://www.roatanchildrenshome.com.
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| | Terry
Registered: 06/29/04
Posts: 131
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Reply with quote | #2 |
Bill Evans
As presented by his grandson, Forest Allderink, at his memorial on 13 May, 2006
My grandfather is known as a man who was constantly moving, constantly working, constantly thinking, and constantly changing everyone and everything he touched.
He was born in Miami Florida on December 17th 1931. The name on the birth certificate was William Horace Evans. That was probably the first thing he changed. He was Bill, or Speedy, or Bubba, or Mr. Bill. We've even heard "El Diablo," but never William or Horace.
He was intelligent, a hard worker, and a skilled craftsman who would tackle any job, especially if it harbored a challenge. Usually, he made it look easy.
At Miami Edison High School, "Speedy" Evans was a popular football star who lived up to his nickname. A name his mother claimed to have given him due to his great speed - at soiling diapers.
On August 27th, 1949, Bill was 17 years old when he eloped with his high school sweetheart, Evelyn Page. My grandmother was 14. Grandpa ran a paper route and was working in an auto paint and body shop when their first son was born in 1950. He never graduated from Edison. Over the next 10 years, alternating between Dayton Ohio, and Miami Florida, there would be 5 more children born to them, and
eventually 10 grandchildren and, to date, 3 great grandchildren.
When he decided to learn to fly in 1956, he launched himself into aviation with the same enthusiasm that he did everything. From private pilot he went to instructor, commercial pilot, then instrument and multi engine ratings. In less than two years he was the owner of the flight school where he had learned to fly. He rebuilt the school and aircraft service and started a parachute club. While he didn't call it that, he was still doing paint and body work. Only this time it was for wrecked airplanes.
After moving back to Dayton he managed body shops and eventually opened Evans Paint and Body in New Carlisle. "Speedy Evans" also owned and raced automobiles in the stock car and super modified classes mostly on dirt tracks in Ohio and around Florida.
After moving back to Florida he worked as a pilot for KLM where he got type ratings for larger aircraft. He bought his first DC3 and charted it to haul both freight and passengers. He moved his family to San Juan, Puerto Rico in 1968 where he started Sun Island Airways and contracted with Windjammer Cruise owner Mike Burke to move his passengers from San Juan to various Caribbean ports. Ironically, decades later, one of those ships he worked with would be destroyed by Hurricane Mitch off the coast of Honduras and pieces would wash ashore a few miles from his home in Roatan Honduras.
In the late 1960's, Bill bought a World War II vintage, wooden hulled, air-sea rescue vessel and refitted it for lobster fishing in the Bahamas. The Johnny C worked mostly out of Andros Island as a wholesale lobster house. Live fish were bought and bagged in burlap then flown, in Bill's planes of course, to market in Florida. He even put an ancient military PBY, a large and very ugly amphibious aircraft to work, landing in open sea to load the cargo. He spent one off season flying early 70's
rock and roll bands to concert sites.
In the 1970's Bill joined a friend's construction company selling concrete formmaterials. Predictably, he moved quickly into hands-on positions: site manager, project manger, general manager. He passed the rigorous exams and was soon licensed by the state of Florida as a general contractor. Bill Evans had a new career. More importantly, there was a whole new world in front of him to tackle.
It was in Cape Coral Florida that, on a whim, he bought a small sailboat and taught himself to sail so efficiently that he dominated the local club races almost immediately. This, of course, lead to bigger and faster sailboats. "Speedy" was back.
He moved to Houston in 1978 where he worked as project and general manager for a large and well-established construction company that became a subsidiary of Armco Steel. It was by far the most corporate position he had ever held. He liked to tell that, during an employee review, it was discovered that he did not meet the minimum requirements for his position. He did not have a degree in engineering. When his boss called him in talk over the problem, Bill told his boss matter of factly
that he was not too concerned about not having a degree n engineering since he didn't have a high school diploma either. Shortly thereafter he found that although his job remained the same, his job title had changed. His boss called him in and explained that it will take a few years for the bureaucrats up the ladder to come up with minimum requirements for his new position.
He was living in Houston and sailing his 33 foot sloop, Karma on Clear Lake and the Gulf of Mexico with longer vacation cruises to the Bahamas when a friend told him about an island off the coast of Honduras called Roatan. His next sailing vacation changed his career once more. And it changed his mailing address for the next 25 years.
After a few sail charters and an ill-fated attempt to redesign a 1929 wood hulled motor yacht as a live-aboard dive boat, Bill negotiated a piece of poorly developed property "in the swamp" off the south shore of Roatan. His optimistic intention, despite only having scuba dived just a few times before in his life, was to build "the best scuba diving resort in the Caribbean." It was 1981. Ronald Reagan was president, the Iran-contra affair would soon be underway, and Honduras was in the press almost daily as a nation at war. Despite the timing, he opened CoCo View Resort in September 1982 with his Honduran friends, Calvin and Stella Bodden.
The next 24 years were without doubt the longest period that Bill and Evelyn lived in a single location. But that does not mean that Bill Evans just sat back with his successful business and propped his feet on the parrot cage, cold Salva Vida in hand and gazing at the Caribbean Sea out his front door. Not at all. "Mr. Bill," as he was now known, built a fishing lodge on the island of Utila 30 miles away. He bought and sold real estate, designed tourist attractions, redesigned and operated another live-aboard dive boat, and went back to Florida for a few weeks to get his float plane rating.
He bought and operated one plane, lost it in a crash and bought another. When the local Honduran air carrier service deteriorated, he opened an airline. Caribbean Air serviced Honduras, the Bay Islands and Belize. All the while he was continually improving the operations and facilities at CoCo View Resort, rebuilding dive boats, running construction equipment and barges between Florida and Honduras and
otherwise being ... well... Bill Evans.
Though he seldom complained of pain, Bill suffered from severe gout and rheumatoid arthritis for most of his life. The disease and medications took their toll, and In June 2004, long after a bypass operation and double knee replacement, Bill sold CoCo View Resort and moved back to Ft. Myers. But he did not slow down. Besides refurbishing his 42 foot Chris Craft motor yacht, 'Bout Time, in his back
yard (which he also redesigned) he dealt in real estate and still has half a dozen real estate and construction projects in the works.
More than anyone we are likely to meet in our lifetime, my grandfather was a man of the land, the air, the sea and the wind. In his short lifetime he touched everyone and everything that he could. And everything he touched, he changed. For this, we celebrate his life, and for this he will live forever.
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