William John Welshons (1922-2009)

WELSHONS, STEELE, SMITH, NAGEL

Posted By: Ames Tribune
Date: 10/3/2009 at 08:29:34

THE AMES TRIBUNE, Ames, Story County, Iowa, Wednesday, September 30, 2009.

William John Welshons died Sept. 5, 2009, at the home of his daughter and son-in-law in South Bend, Ind., of complications from leukemia. A memorial service for Bill and his wife, Jean, will be at 3 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 3, at Stevens Memorial Chapel in Ames.

Bill was born July 18, 1922, in Pitcairn, Pa., to parents William and Nellie (Steele) Welshons. After high school, he moved to California where he enlisted in the U.S. Navy and served as a signalman on the USS Auriga during World War II, delivering troops and equipment to locations in the war zone. Following his discharge, he enrolled on the GI bill at the University of California at Berkeley because one of his shipmates had once pointed the campus out to him from the deck of their ship. There he met Harriet Jean Smith. They were married June 25, 1949, and spent the rest of their lives together.

After graduate school, he continued his training at the Oak Ridge National Lab in Tennessee where he discovered that the Y chromosome carried the male-determining genes in mice and was therefore responsible for male/female sex determination in mammals. This is common knowledge today, but at the time, sex-determination was thought to be selected by the number of X chromosomes present, as is the case in insects. He spent most of his professional life at Iowa State University, where he was a professor and researcher for the Department of Genetics, acting as the Head of the department for a decade. After his retirement, he and Jean traveled widely.

He is survived by his four children, daughter, Ellen Franco and husband, Joseph, and sons, Robert Welshons and wife, Odette, James Welshons and wife, Margie, and Wade Welshons and wife, Susan Nagel; 10 grandchildren, Ishmael, Francis, Tabor, Jessica, Chrissy, Stacey, Joel, Nathaniel, Jack and Samantha; and six great-grandchildren, Justice, Catriona, Cademan, Carrissa, Mira and Riley.

He was preceded in death by his parents; one sister, Mary, who died at age 10; and his wife, Jean, after 59 years of marriage.

Like his wife, he donated his body to the school of medicine in the state of Indiana.

Condolences may be left at www.stevensmemorialchapel.com .

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