WILLIAM ENARD LYONS

William E. Lyons, the son of Walter L. & Anna L. Lyons, was born in Vincennes, September 19, 1913. He entered Riley Elementary School’s kindergarten in 1918, then progressed through Clark Junior High School then Lincoln High School, graduating in 1931. While at Lincoln, he was a member of the National Honor Society, the Dramatic Club, wrote for the Old Post Sentinel and the 1931 Year Book, and was Vice-President of the YMCA’s Hi-Y Club.

Upon graduating from Lincoln, Lyons was named runner-up for the Knox County Indiana University scholarship. After two semesters at I.U., the bank closings caused him to return home where he attended Vincennes, University one semester before going to work at the Brown Shoe Factory. He returned to Lincoln for a commercial course, then was employed in tracing Knox County real estate titles for the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation, after which he started a 43 year career in the U.S. Treasury Department, working as a clerk for the Receiver of the First National Bank of Vincennes.

In 1937 he started working for the Collector of Internal Revenue at Indianapolis, traveling the state setting up files for the newly imposed Social Security tax. In 1941, he was one of the first draftees and returned home to join the first Vincennes troop train of 107 men to Indianapolis for induction into the army on April 7, 1941. After basic training with the 38th Infantry Division he was accepted for Officers’ Candidate School at Miami Beach and became a "90-Day Wonder" Second Lieutenant in the Air Corps upon graduating in December, 1942. Assigned to Goodfellow Field at San Angelo, Texas, he served there as Intelligence Officer, etc. until posted for oversees duty in the fall of 1943. Joining a convoy across the Atlantic to the ETO, Lyons served briefly in Northern Ireland before being assigned to the Midlands of England, where he served the rest of his oversees time with an outfit flying black B-24 "Liberators" denominated as the 492nd Bomb Group, whose activities were written in a November, 1945 Reader’s Digest article entitled "Scarlet Pimpernels of the Air." (Carpetbagging)

After V-E Day, Lyons returned to Vincennes for a 30 days Rehab before his new assignment in Okinawa, but after V-J Day, was sent to Sioux Falls, S.D. and finally processed off active duty November 23, 1945—4 years, 8 months after induction. Returned to civilian life, he resumed employment with the IRS with post of duty in Vincennes, and thereafter transferred back to Indianapolis, continuing his education under the G.I. Bill, taking night classes at I.U. School of Law, from which he graduated and became an attorney with the Treasury Department’s Appellate Division.

Lyons, a 43-year employee of the Treasury Department, is a lifetime (50-year plus) member of Lodge #1, F. & A.M. (Masonic) and has been supportive of Vincennes institutions; made a distinguished alumnus of Lincoln High School in 1998, he endowed scholarships at Vincennes University and the YMCA and has also contributed to L.H.S. Academic Society of which he is a member, and he is a Mentor with the Literacy Foundation.

Lyons was married to Alice Hider and they traveled extensively throughout the world before and after his retirement in 1978. She died in 1993.

Distinquished Alumni 1998

Class of 1931