Memories
This section is for sharing anecdotes, photos and video about William to build a clearer picture of his storied life and legacy. It’s meant to be a living document to track the places he lived, the community he was part of, the events he created, the creative projects he initiated and the friendships he maintained for many years.
If you have any stories, anecdotes, or photos to share, please fill out this form and we’ll post them.
If you have questions or comments please email us at quillemot.archive@gmail.com.
Early Years
William was born and raised in Providence, Rhode Island. He spent many summers at the family cottage on Martha’s Vineyard with his parents Frank Stewart, professor of Mathematics at Brown University, and his mother Caroline…
The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence
The first meeting of The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence took place in William’s apartment and he designed their first logo for a huge banner in an early march.
Gay Freedom Day
William arrived in San Francisco in the late 1970s during one of the most formative periods in the evolution of queer counterculture and played an active and creative role in the community during the first decades of gay liberation…
Radical Faeries
William was part of the early Radical Faeries, attended the first gathering in Benson, AZ, August 31-Sept. 2, 1979 and brought that wisdom and sense of community back to the city in collective living experiments he was part of…
The AIDS Epidemic
As the AIDS epidemic swept through San Francisco, William was deeply affected by the suffering and deaths of those around him…
Touchstone
Touchstone was an intentional community of radical faeries located at 981 Haight Street. The kitchen was the heart of the place…
The Bryant Street Studio
In 1981, William rented a studio at 1150 Bryant Street, from which he did commercial calligraphy, taught calligraphy classes through the Friends of Calligraphy, and created a wide body of calligraphic art pieces.
The Martha’s Vineyard Years
Retreating somewhat from the intensity of the AIDS years, in 1989 William began studying linguistics at San Francisco State University. For several years following his degree in 1993, William lived both in San Francisco and on Martha’s Vineyard at the family cottage near Seth’s Pond…
Sixtieth Birthday Celebration
William celebrated his sixtieth birthday in May 2011 with a huge gathering in San Francisco, with both west coast and east coast friends attending…
Groundswell Project
In William’s first-ever solo ritual in 2010, he wrote, “My dream is to be a generous-hearted and beloved elder in a tribe of queer-spirit folk committed to reciprocal mirroring and consciousness-raising”…
Seventieth Birthday Celebration
William celebrated his seventieth birthday in May 2021 at Groundswell. For months prior, he assembled and mounted his last art installation — a bedroom whose walls were filled with photos of the beloved dead, of friends and special occasions, of Martha’s Vineyard, of gay art. It was an altar honoring a lifetime of love, loss, and learning.
William’s Final Journey
Mere weeks after his birthday celebration, a long-time cough sent William to UC San Francisco Medical Center, which resulted in an emergency tracheostomy and a diagnosis of aggressive thyroid cancer whose prognosis was a year or less. Suddenly the man who lived by and for words — writing, lettering, studying — could not speak. But he wrote! Text messages and paper notes poured out of him in the gaps for months to come…
Echo Chamber
For William’s 70th birthday celebration he created an installation in his cottage at Groundswell of all of his beloved friends and mentors.
Harry Nicholson né Kelley
“…I lived at Touchstone. It was magical, challenging in the best way, and one of the honors of my life to live there…”
Alexander (Alessio) Monsanto
“I believe I first met William in 2011 or 2012. We saw each other when he lived in Southern Oregon at Wolf Creek. But we really began to know each other through his friendship with Jesse Oliver Sanford at the faerie house Grand Central…”
Will Roscoe
“…William played a foundation role in the creation of Vortex: A Journal of New Vision, a zine that my partner Bradley Rose and I published between 1980 and 1982…”
Cass Brayton
“… I know he designed the first Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence logo and did the lettering still in use today (January 2024). William was Sister Succuba of the Sisters…”
charlie (opal) seltzer
“[I met William in] 1986 at the faerie household he shared with Mika Kindman in SF…”