William "Bill" Mills

William "Bill" Mills, 52, of Hutsonville, IL, passed away unexpectedly on August 27, 2026, at Ascension St. Vincent in Evansville, IN, but not before living life all the way out to the edges. Trying to fit him into an obituary is a little like trying to fit the river into a bucket: you'll get some of it, but the best part keeps running past you.

He was born on May 14, 1974, in Olney, IL, and from the very first day, little Billy came into the world with energy to spare, a sharp mind, and a gift for never meeting a stranger. That boy never really changed. What you saw at the beginning was what you got for the next fifty-two years. Even then, the shape of the man was showing. He was always drawn to big equipment, a foreshadowing of the passion that would define his working years. And he loved animals...well, loved to pester them, mostly. He chased his mom around with snakes and somehow never got bit, not as a boy and not years later, when he decided threading one through his belt loop was a reasonable thing to do.

Bill was gifted enough with his hands that finding work was never a problem, so he quit high school and got right to it. One of his first jobs had him hauling ceramic out of the pottery for Fred Mehler. He worked off and on with Everingham Tree Service alongside his family and drove for Casey's for a stretch, where the people on his route became family on the road and took good care of him. The through-line, though, was Annapolis Grain. He worked there off and on for years, and he couldn't say enough good about Chad and his family, who were wonderful people to work for. Chad knew better than most what he was getting in Bill, because the man's gift with equipment was the whole reason to keep him around. You couldn't tell him something couldn't be done. Say it, and he'd take that as an invitation to prove you wrong. He could take a pile of junk and turn it into something great. And get him near any piece of equipment, and he'd climb aboard and run it like he'd been doing it all his life. And he took good care of it all—every machine, every engine—right up until you noticed that his own stuff never got the same courtesy.

That love of anything with an engine didn't clock out when he did. The minute work was behind him, Bill was off chasing the next ride. Not one to slow down—and sure as heck not one to stay cooped up inside—Bill was always after the next thing. The minute his son Anthony got home from school, the two of them would hop on the four-wheelers and ride well into the night. Some days, they made for the Wabash. They lost whole evenings on the sandbar together, and in the water, Bill was something to see. He swam like a fish and moved like a torpedo, a gift that came straight from growing up on the river. He was so at home there that he could do things that had no business being possible. Once, he caught a catfish with his bare hands. When Anthony asked how on earth he managed it, Bill said he "could smell it." Of course, the river got the better of him now and then, too. He'd get stuck in it, and one time he flipped his boat entirely, a problem he solved the way Bill solved most things: by making the best of it and riding the overturned hull all the way back to the dock!

When he wasn't on the river, chances were good he was camping, and Sullivan Lake was the favorite. The friends he made there didn't stay friends for long. They became family, the way people always seemed to around Bill. Nobody was allowed to leave hungry, either. Come the last morning, with everyone breaking camp to head home, Bill would be cooking. Biscuits and gravy were the staple, and he made enough for everybody, one last plate together before the long drives home. Speaking of those long drives, the road brought out some of Bill's finest work. One day, he was out riding his motorcycle and passed a group of fellow bikers, giving them the customary wave. When nobody returned it, he decided that this simply wasn't going to do. So he turned around, came at them again, this time popping a wheelie. He then turned around one more time to pass them again, earning a wave from every single rider. That was Bill in a single stunt: he'd win you over one way or another.

Nowhere did that determination show up plainer than with Jamie. Bill told her early on that he was going to ask her to marry him every year until she said "yes." He did exactly that, proposing at the end of the driveway once a year for ten years straight. She eventually accepted, and they were married on July 19, 2008. Romantic in his own way, sure. But mostly it was Bill being Bill: he'd found what he wanted, and quitting was never on the table. And once Bill had it, he loved it with everything in him. The family he built was the great pride of his life. Simply put, nothing meant more to Bill than being a dad and a grandpa. He was endlessly proud of Anthony, and in his grandson Spencer, he found pure, unadulterated joy. Spencer even inherited Bill's gift of gab—proof, if anyone needed it, that some things run straight down the line. For all his talking, Bill loved a quiet evening just as much, just sitting on the porch, letting nature carry on around him.

Mostly, though, Bill lived out loud. He was true to himself to the core and never gave a thought to what anyone made of it. He went without a shirt as a matter of principle and was never caught without his sunglasses (unless, of course, the river had claimed them again). Many people knew him as "Wild Bill," and he'd earned every letter of it. He had a greeting all his own: "Hello sunshine!" The funny thing was, it fit him better than whoever he was aiming it at. Bill was the sunshine, the light in the room the second he walked in. But that sunshine came with a glint of mischief in his eye, because Bill was always up to something. If you climbed into anything with him and caught that twinkle, the smart move was to hold on tight. You were about to go on an adventure.

With Bill, the adventure was the whole point. He'd try anything, talk to anyone, and get himself into trouble doing both. He could make you mad enough to swing at him and win you all the way back before the hour was out, because he simply couldn't bear to leave anyone mad at him. Because underneath all of it, Bill was made of softer stuff than he let on. The rough exterior was real, but so was the heart of gold under it. He'd do anything for anybody, and when someone was hurting, he hurt right alongside them. And now he's gone and done exactly that, left a whole crowd of us aching over him. Still, a light like his doesn't leave all at once. It lingers, the way the warmth of a good day hangs on after the sun's gone down. And Bill left a lot of warmth behind. It's in the memories, the stories, and the whole crowd of people he turned into family. The ache is real, but so is the light he left burning behind him.

Fittingly, the light didn't stop with him. Through the gift of organ and tissue donation, a part of Bill goes on in others, bringing life where it was needed. For a man who'd give the shirt off his back—that is, when he actually wore one—it's a fitting final gift.

Bill is survived by his wife, Jamie Mills; his son, Anthony (Carol) Mills; his grandson, Spencer; his parents, Peggy (Dee) Everingham and George William Mills; his brother, Jake (Tara) Mills, and their daughter, Alexis; and his sister, Tammy Engel; along with a host of extended family and friends. He was preceded in death by his grandparents, Gene and Patricia Daugherty and Willard and Maxine Roberts; and by his sister, Tracy Parker.

Bill is to be cremated, and his family will hold a celebration of Bill's life at a later date. The Goodwine Funeral Home in Robinson is assisting the family at this time.