WILLIAM EDWARD (BILL) MORRISS

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WILLIAM EDWARD (BILL) MORRISS Bill Morriss passed away from lung cancer September 19, 2003 at age 84 at Grace Hospital in Winnipeg. He is survived by his beloved wife Gerrie; son Lorne; son John and his wife Joan; granddaughter Sarah; and nieces, Penny (Morriss) Longley in Halifax and Bambi (Morriss) Reilly in Gilford, ON and their children. He was predeceased by three brothers, Harold, Frank and John. Bill was born in Winnipeg in 1919, the fourth son of the late Howard Joseph and Mary Ann (Alexander) Morriss. After graduating from high school in 1936 he intended to eventually be a visual artist but was employed as an accountant until enlisting in the Canadian Army 1940. He was transferred to the Royal Canadian Air Force in 1941. He served in coastal, bomber and transport commands in Alaska and Europe. Bill joined the Winnipeg Free Press as an artist in 1946, but after less than a week was asked to fill in for a reporter and never returned to the art department. In 1952 he left to work with Winnipeg Metropolitan Civil Defence where he completed the first civil defence evacuation plan in Canada. In 1955, he joined Ladco, a Winnipeg land development company, and became manager a year later. In 1962 Bill returned to the Free Press, where he covered the Legislature and provincial and federal election campaigns. He became president of the Legislative Press gallery and was active in the Winnipeg Press Club, serving as president in 1965. In 1966, Bill accepted with some initial reluctance an offer he could not refuse to join the Manitoba Co-operator as editor. He wondered whether covering agriculture would ever match the excitement of his love of covering politics. He soon said it was the best move he ever made. Bill was fascinated by farming and farm policy, and particularly enjoyed writing weekly editorials. In 1971, Bill took on the additional responsibility of publisher. He retired in 1984 and was hired to write the history of the Canadian Wheat Board. He completed the project in 1987 and the first part of the book, Chosen Instrument: The McIvor Years, was published that year and the second part, Chosen Instrument II: New Horizons, was published in 2000. In 1987 Bills former position at the Co-operator became vacant suddenly, and he was asked to return. He stayed until 1989, and then began work on another book, Watch the Rope. One of the jobs of a law courts reporter in the late 1940s and early 1950s was to attend the hangings of those convicted of murder. As a veteran who had lost a brother in the war, and as one of the first Allied servicemen into the concentration camp at Bergen Belsen in 1945, Bill had been hardened to death, but he wrote that "Nothing had prepared me, however, to witness those cold-blooded ritual killings, prescribed precisely as to time and place and committed in the name of society." He was deeply concerned by calls for a Commons debate on restoring capital punishment. In reviewing court records and other evidence, he uncovered proof of the innocence of Lawrence Deacon, one of the men whose hangings he witnessed. Watch the Rope was published in 1996 and remains as his reminder of the barbarity of capital punishment in a civil society. The family wishes to thank the doctors and staff on the third floor of the Grace Hospital for their care and compassion in Bills final days. Private interment. A memorial service will be held at 3:30, Thursday, September 25, at St. Matthews Anglican Church, 641 St. Matthews at Maryland. Flowers gratefully declined. Donations in Bills memory can be made to The Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted, 85 King Street East, Toronto, ON M5C 1G3. Bill would also be pleased if He could influence you to stop smoking. Gilbart Funeral Home, Selkirk in care of arrangements.

As published in Winnipeg Free Press on Sep 25, 2003