William M. Wheeler (1923-2011) volunteered as a United States Army Air Corps pilot and was inducted into the service in 1943. He was transferred to the Tuskegee Institute, earned his wings as a Tuskegee Airman fighter pilot a year later, and was commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant. He was assigned to the 302nd Fighter Squadron in Ramitelli, Italy, and carried out bomber escort missions over Europe. His combat career was cut short on his sixth mission when a respiratory ailment caused him to black out at 36,000 feet. Luckily, he regained consciousness at 8,000 feet and returned safely to his home base. He was honorably discharged in 1945. In 2007, Wheeler and his fellow Tuskegee Airmen received the Congressional Medal of Honor presented by then-President George W. Bush.

Born in Detroit, Michigan, Wheeler was the second of four children of Ada and Leon “Toy” Wheeler, who was the director of Detroit’s Brewster-Wheeler Recreation Center. William graduated from Northwestern High School before going on to study at Howard University in the early 1940s. As a sophomore in 1943, he left school to enlist and attended basic training at Keesler Field, Mississippi, then transferring to the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama for flight training. After his return from Europe in 1945, he met and married Minnie Jenkens, and the couple raised three children together.

Wheeler's career included positions in the publishing and aircraft industries, and ultimately in banking as vice president of National Bank of North America and its successor, National Westminster Bank. Following his retirement in 1991, he traveled nationally and internationally to speak with civic groups about the history of the Tuskegee Airmen. He was awarded an honorary doctorate degree from Tuskegee University in 2006, and from Lehman College in 2009, and he was the recipient of many combat awards and decorations, including the Air Medal, European/African/Middle Eastern Theater Campaign Medal, American Campaign Medal, the National Defense Service Medal.

A longtime resident of Hempstead, New York, Wheeler died of heart failure on February 19, 2011. In 2014, 2nd Lt. William M. "Wild Bill" Wheeler Way, located at the southeast corner of Tuskegee Airmen Way and 153rd Street in South Jamaica, was named in his honor.