TUSCALOOSA, AL.- William Walker Way passed away Sunday, Sept. 24, 2006, at the University of Alabama Children’s Hospital in Birmingham. William was born on August 6, 1991 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama to Linda Kathryn McKnight and Jack Spiller Way. He was an honor student at Gordo High School, where he also played junior varsity football and baseball. William was an avid outdoorsman and horseman, and was active in the 4-H Forestry Club for many years. He also showed Tennessee Walking Horses competitively with his father and brothers. William was an active member of
the Gordo United Methodist Church and the UMYF.
He is predeceased by his mother, Linda Kathryn McKnight, and his grandparents, William Baldwin McKnight, Winston Winfield Way, Sr., and Mary Jean Spiller Way.
He is survived by his father, Jack Spiller Way; his brothers, Winston Elliott Way, Thaddeus Winfield Way, Andrew Jackson Smithart IV, and Alexander Spiller Way; a sister, Mary Frances Stallworth Way; his grandmother, Helen Bowling McKnight; his stepfather, Daniel Porter Gibson; and his stepmother, Bentley Shanahan Way. Williams is also survived by many other aunts, uncles and cousins in Tuscaloosa County and elsewhere. Pallbearers will be Kenneth Carr Chambliss, Kenneth Parker Chambliss (both from Birmingham), Joseph Curtis Hargrove, Jr. (Tuscaloosa), Edward
Ashton Hill III (Mobile), Dustin Coe McDow (Tuscaloosa), Kyle Douglas Posey (Gordo), John Robert Spiller, Jr. (Tuscaloosa), and Charles Lindell Wright, Jr. (Leeds).
Honorary pallbearers are Lawrence William Coleman, Jr. (Montgomery), Eli Joseph Hare, Nicholas Stallworth Hare III (both from Monroeville), Harrison Barnett Lee, John Squire Lee (both from Union Springs), Michael Shane Spiller (Tuscaloosa) and Tyler Walker Herndon (Ripley, Tenn.).
Services will be 10 a.m. today, Sept. 26, 2006, at Gordo United Methodist Church in Gordo, Ala. Interment will follow at Gordo City Cemetery with Tuscaloosa Memorial Chapel Funeral Home directing.
The family requests that in lieu of flowers, friends make charitable contributions to the Pediatric Neuro Oncology Program at UAB Children’s Hospital or to the Joe Lee Griffin Hope Lodge, Birmingham, Ala.