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From art teacher to band performer: How Tom Wills stays vibrant at 73
NEW MADRID, Mo. — “If I didn’t do something and stay active, I would probably go crazy,” Tom Wills says with a laugh. “I’m just an ordinary guy and I like to stay busy.”
At 73, Wills has kept busy in many careers.
A graduate of Murray State University, Wills originally moved to New Madrid to be an art teacher at New Madrid High School. After seven years of teaching, Wills opted for a higher-paying job with Noranda, where he worked 28 years, retiring in 2008.
Wills was then able to combine his love for art with a new career as manager of the Riverwalk Art Gallery, then located in the Hart-Stepp House. When budget cuts closed the gallery, Wills found work at the Hunter-Dawson State Historic Site as an interpreter.
“I have been here ever since,” Wills explained. “I’m one of those people that can’t sit around. And, here, you never know what you are going to get to do or who is going to come through the door.”
As an interpreter at the site, Wills’ main job is to give tours. During down time, he helps keep the house’s interior tidy in preparation for the next visitors or will join fellow interpreter Matt Davis in creating videos for the site’s popular Facebook page.
But talking with visitors about the 1860s house is his favorite part of the job, Wills said. He particularly enjoyed the many visitors brought by the riverboats traveling up and down the Mississippi River.
“You never know who you would meet because you would have people from all over the world on those riverboats,” Wills said. “The ones I enjoyed the most were from England and Australia because I always enjoyed their accents.”
Although well-versed in the site’s history, Wills admitted occasionally visitors will pose a question he can’t answer. Often it is the younger visitors who have the most difficult questions, he added.
The annual Christmas Candlelight tours are also a favorite time, drawing lots of visitors to the house.
For those tours, Wills and the rest of the staff wear clothes typical of the 1860s. The women are in their dresses with hoop skirts and Wills and the other male interpreters are attired in wool suits and vests.
“Those are kind of warm and itchy,” he said about the wool suits, adding, “But it is fun.”
Vicki Jackson, site administrator for the Hunter-Dawson Historic Site, described Wills as a great employee, who is always willing to help and looking for ways to enhance the site.
“Tom is great on tours,” she said. “He is good with making people feel comfortable and has a great sense of humor.”
When not working at the Hunter-Dawson State Historic Site, Wills has found more to keep him busy.
He said he has always enjoyed sculpture, in particular taking things others might consider junk and creating something new. One of his favorite pieces was a large peacock he fashioned from copper pennies. He has created numerous mobiles to dance in the wind in his front yard. Also, he makes and sells wood bee traps to capture pesky carpenter bees which are found in Southeast Missouri.
But these days, his love for the arts is most often displayed when playing with fellow musicians in the band Ol’ Rivertown.
Wills plays guitar and the dobro lap guitar with slide in the six-member group. Working with bandmate and songwriter David Porter, Wills will pitch in with some of the melodies for their songs as well.
Describing their weekly practices as more fun than work, Wills said the band members have grown close.
“There is a real friendship, a camaraderie. We are almost like brothers we have played together so long and that is what is fun,” he explained.
Wills and the other members of Ol’ Rivertown were the opening act for New Madrid’s first-ever Music on the Mississippi, a concert featuring The Marshall Tucker Band.
An estimated 3,000 people turned out for the event.
“I thought we would be nervous as heck because we had never played in front of a crowd that big. But we enjoyed ourselves and had a good time,” said Wills. “It was kind of a once-in-a-lifetime thing at least for me. I’m 73 years old. I may not get to do something like that again. But it is fun to say you played on stage in front of a well-known band like The Marshall Tucker Band.”
These days, Wills has one more thing to keep him busy. He is battling cancer.
In 2015, Wills was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a cancer which attacks the bone marrow.
After initial treatments the cancer went into remission but Wills’ doctor warned him it might wake up again. Recently the disease did return.
Currently Wills travels to the Mercy Cancer Center at Cape Girardeau every other week for treatments.
“There is no cure for it but luckily I am still here and I feel pretty good,” said Wills with a smile. “My work, my music and my art, that is what keeps me sane through this ordeal.”