WILLIAM T. GARD , 76, of New Canton, died Saturday evening (Dec. 30, 1995) in`his cottage at Cincinnati Landing. Born Oct. 9, 1919, on the family homestead near New Canton, he was a son of William H. and Clair Decker Gard. On July 1, 1939, he married Martha Davis near Troy. She survives. During World War II, Mr. Gard was a cryptographer with the Army Air Corps. He enjoyed golf­ing and fishing and had been working on a history of the Sny Island Levee Drainage District for the last several years. He also enjoyed genealogy, liked to travel and played banjo. Mr. Gard was a member of New Canton Masonic Lodge 821, the Ansar Temple in Springfield and its Jazz Band and Legion of Honor, Pike and Quincy Shrine clubs, Order of Eastern Star New Canton Chapter 215, Scottish Rite, Royal Order of Jesters Court 20, Barry American Legion Post 222, Pike County Farm Bureau, and New Canton United Methodist Church. He was treasurer of the New Canton Cemetery Associ­ation, secretary and treasurer of the New Canton Fire Protection District, past superintendent and treasurer of the Sny Island Levee District, director of the West Pike School Board, and director of the Illinois Rural Electrification As­sociation of Winchester. Also surviving are a son, Curtis of New Canton; a daughter, Mrs. John (Mary Elaine) Leeper of Colleyville, Texas; two grand­children, Gard and Lisa Leeper, both of Colleyville; and two half sisters, Gretta Dayhuff of Gravel Switch, Ky., and Mary Cashman of Chester. Services will be conducted at 11 a.m. Wednesday in the Kirgan Funeral Home in Barry. Burial will be in Shearer Cemetery. Visitation will be 5-8 tonight with Masonic services at 7:30 p.m. Memorials may be made to Shriners` Hospital for Crippled Children.
Transcribed by Rosemary Reeves