WILLIAM M. EMMONS

     William Miles Emmons passed away Wednesday June 15, 2022, peacefully at his home. He was 93. He was born on April 7, 1929, the only son of the late Merritt and Amy Harker Emmons. Bill was predeceased less than a year ago by his beloved wife of 70 years, Kathleen Nixon Emmons.

     Born and raised on a farm in Pemberton Township in 1929, he attended Pemberton Borough schools from pre-first through high school. He graduated from Pemberton High School in 1947, where he lettered in football, basketball, and baseball. He married his childhood sweetheart Kathleen in 1950 at the Pemberton United Methodist Church and then moved into the Borough, where he lived the rest of his life.

     Bill lived a full life, loving his family, his community, and his Phillies. Bill was a man known for his hands-on and down-to-earth approach to life. He was a loving family man. He built his own beautiful home, and he worked 40 years for N. J. Bell in a career specializing in data and digital loop equipment as well as fiber optic networks. He retired in 1991 as a Special Services supervisor and was a member of the Telephone Pioneers of America.

     Over the course of his life, Bill has also been a dedicated leader in his town- focused on the future of Pemberton Borough and its citizens. He was a Mason and a Rotarian. He served on the Pemberton Borough School Board for 10 years and served on the Borough Council as Council President for over 40 years, from 1974 to 2014. He always valued the small-town atmosphere of historic Pemberton Borough. He worked tirelessly to maintain tax rates, manage growth, maintain a quality local police force, and procure grants to build the municipal building, the fire house, and line the streets with lampposts and flowers, all at little or no cost to taxpayers.

     His early life on the farm in Pemberton Township certainly laid the groundwork for his future. When he was 10, he and his Shetland pony won first place in the Rotary sponsored Halloween parade. A Silver Dollar was his prize. Billy was a Rotarian for most of his adult life. As a young boy in the early years of WWII, he and his mother together would take early morning shifts on a watch tower near Arney’s Mount equipped with a phone connection to Fort Dix and McQuire, looking for the enemy in the air. Bill subsequently spent over 40 years working with telecommunications. As a teen, he used his first paycheck from his job downtown in the American store to buy a used bicycle so that he could get back and forth to work from the farm. As a working adult, he used part of each paycheck to buy the materials he needed to build his home.

     Bill is survived by son Barry (Maggi), and daughter Kathy Bernacki (Joe), grandchildren Brett Emmons (Roshni), Will Emmons (Laura), Ben Bernacki (Janae) and Betsy Emmons, and six great grandchildren.

     Visitation will be held on Friday, June 24, 2022, from 9:30-10:45, followed by Masonic and Memorial services, at Lankenau Funeral Home, 31 Elizabeth Street in Pemberton.

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